


Punchline

by backtoblack101



Category: The Haunting of Bly Manor (TV)
Genre: Comedy, F/F, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Smut, Light Angst, Romantic Comedy, Smut, literally takes place in a comedy club, so it's a comedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-10
Updated: 2021-01-10
Packaged: 2021-03-13 22:42:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 29,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28661160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/backtoblack101/pseuds/backtoblack101
Summary: “Name?”She looks up at the gruff bouncer and clears her throat. “Danielle. Uh, Danielle Clayton. I’m performing tonight.”He makes quick work of scanning the list in front of him. “I’ve a Dani Clayton here, that you?”Dani jerks her head once in confirmation. “Yea, yea it’s my uh- it’s my stage--”He doesn’t care. “In the main doors and up the staircase on your right before you reach the main bar. The other acts are already up there in the dressing room.”ORDani is sick of suburbia, sick of Eddie. Sick of her life in general really.So why not give comedy a go to break the monotony of everyday life. What's the worst that could happen? It's not like she'd meet the love of her life in the dressing room of Bly Manor Bar and have her entire life in suburbia turned upside down... right?
Relationships: Dani Clayton & Jamie, Dani Clayton/Jamie
Comments: 39
Kudos: 184





	Punchline

**Author's Note:**

> I'm back at it again with the whole adapting 80's movies into Damie fics. Who knew this would become my thing? This one is the movie Punchline with Tom Hanks, Sally Fields and John Goodman. I was slightly more into this film than I was the last one I wrote a fic about - although I still didn't like the ending - though I do think this one is just as loosely adapted. 
> 
> In fact the only thing taken directly from the film are any good jokes you find in this fic. I am not a comedian, so I take no credit for the good jokes. Also there are a lot of jokes poking fun at Irish people in this. Although I am not a comedian, I am Irish, so that's allowed. No one can judge me for that.
> 
> Oh also I couldn't bring myself to edit this thoroughly. I am so so sorry. All mistakes are mine and mine alone.

“Name?”

She looks up at the gruff bouncer and clears her throat. “Danielle. Uh, Danielle Clayton. I’m performing tonight.”

He makes quick work of scanning the list in front of him. “I’ve a Dani Clayton here, that you?”

Dani jerks her head once in confirmation. “Yea, yea it’s my uh- it’s my stage--”

He doesn’t care. “In the main doors and up the staircase on your right before you reach the main bar. The other acts are already up there in the dressing room.”

“Thanks.”

Dani pushes past him and in the doors of Bly Manor Bar. She releases a queasy breath and tries to steady herself. She can hear the ruckus of a crowd through the door in front of her and her leg hops with an urge to run.

“Now or never…” she reminds herself in a defiant whisper. “Be brave.”

She wheels around to her right and climbs the stairs.

\----

“Is this uh- this the dressing room?” Dani asks no one in particular.

The room is sparsely furnished. A few beaten up lockers line one wall and in the centre of the room there’s an assortment of couches that look like they’ve been dragged in off the side of the street. A coffee table in the centre of the room holds a few half empty beer bottles and some other paraphernalia Dani’s not so familiar with.

“You’re here for the variety show?” A woman with kind eyes looks up from the sheet she’s reading.

“Yea- yea, I uh- I am.” Dani settles on, her throat suddenly painfully dry.

The woman smiles at her, strides across the room and puts an arm around her shoulder. “I’m Hannah,” she offers, gently leading Dani across to the couches. “And I presume this is your first time performing?”

Dani nods. “I don’t really know why I’m doing it,” she admits, more to herself than to Hannah, though it is nice to have a stranger as a soundboard to her manic decision making.

“Probably to prove to yourself that you can,” Hannah offers, pushing Dani gently into one of the dusty couch cushions.

It’s comfortable, Dani notes. For as threadbare and mouldy as it looks, this couch is a lot more comfortable than anything in her own pristine home. The thought makes her want to laugh. Instead she just looks back up at Hannah.

“I’m Dani.” It feels weird, this new nickname she’s come up with for herself - no one’s ever called her anything other than Danielle before.

She thinks that’s probably at least part of the reason she chose it in the first place. It didn’t seem right, using the same name for this that she uses at church, or at sunday dinner with her husband's family.

As much as Dani Clayton does not fit with that part of her life she doesn’t think Danielle O’Mara fits particularly well with this part. The part where she tells Eddie she’s going to a book club and instead takes the train into the city to do, well--

“Well Dani, you look like you need a drink dear.” Hannah’s already looking up at someone behind Dani. “Owen, do you have anything for our newest star?”

Dani twists in her seat at the sound of clinking bottles. Owen - Dani presumes - is rummaging around in a travel bag that’s haphazardly stuffed inside one of the lockers. He emerges quickly, with a bottle of tequila in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other.

“Pick your poison,” he offers her with a friendly smile.

Dani doesn’t remember the last time she’d seen so many friendly smiles in such a short space of time. If her life in the suburbs has taught her anything it’s that most smiles that seem friendly are only there to hide teeth. Ones that bite with questions like  _ so when will you be giving up teaching and giving Eddie all those kids he wants  _ or questions like  _ I didn’t know wearing a dress above the knee to church was so in vogue right now. _

“Oh gosh,” Dani giggles nervously at the offer, “I really don’t know I should drink tequila before performing.”

“Wine it is!” Owen puts the tequila back in the bag and rounds the couch to sit next to her. “I personally would’ve gone with the tequila, I find it helps te-quila your nerves.”

Hannah settles on one of the couches across from them. “It may surprise you to learn that Owen does a comedy set here.”

“Hey!” Owen shoots back, unscrewing the lid of the bottle and not seeming annoyed at all really. “That’s some of my best material.”

Hannah scoffs a little. “No it’s not.” She watches Owen pass the bottle across to Dani. “Drink,” she encourages, “we all had our first night on that stage at one point or another, as long as you’re still sober enough to remember your act then a little drink to calm the nerves does no harm.”

“She’s right y’know,” Owen agrees. “Actually, come back here enough and one thing you’ll learn is that Hannah’s always right.”

Dani takes a swig of the wine, enjoys how it burns away some of the dryness in her throat. “We’ll see how tonight goes before I make any grand plans to return.”

“Nonsense,” Hannah berates. “First nights are always far too nerve wracking to be fun. You have to have at least one fun night here before you make your mind up on whether or not it’s for you.”

Dani smiles at her, wants to thank her for being so encouraging, but instead just takes another swig of wine. “What type of act do you do?” She asks instead - afraid of letting the silence stretch on too long in case her two new acquaintances get bored of helping her settle in and instead leave her with nothing but a bottle of cheap merlot and her anxious thoughts.

“I sing,” Hannah explains.

“Like an angel,” Owen adds.

Hannah rolls her eyes. “A ghost perhaps,” she offers instead with a self-deprecating smile. “One doomed to haunt the grounds of Bly Manor Bar until her voice dries up and people forget about her.”

“I can’t imagine anyone ever being able to forget you,” Owen murmurs.

Dani catches Hannah’s blush and she glaces between the two. There’s something so soft between them suddenly, something Dani feels she’s intruding on. She’s just about to excuse herself when someone else breaks the tension for her.

“Why is it every time I come in here you two are giving one another love eyes?”

It’s an english accent, Dani realises, brash and boisterous and she turns towards its source at the top of the stairs. Sea green eyes and a lazy smile, both framed by wild brown curls and a jaw that could cut glass.

Something instinctual tells Dani to look away before the sight of this woman burns her and so she does, takes another swig of wine. She settles back into pleasant conversation with Hannah, tries not to listen to Owen and the brunette - Jamie she thinks she hears Owen call her - squabbling like siblings on either side of her.

Tries not to think of the brunette at all really - that’s the last thing her nerves need tonight.

\----

“Okay after this guy it’s you,” Owen tells her, a friendly arm on her upper back as he coaxes her towards the staircase at the far end of the room that leads down to back stage.

“How much longer?” Dani asks, only half listening as she focuses instead on taking deep, calming breaths.

Owen peaks his head over the railings and down at the stage. “He’s on to the sock puppets now, so not much longer, maybe one or two jokes.”

“Sock puppets?”

“He’s a ventriloquist, but with sock puppets,” Owen shrugs. “Not really sure myself if I’m honest, though he’s been doing the same act for years so I know when it’s ending.”

Dani nods. “Should I go stand backstage then?”

“Guess so…” Owen encourages, one last pat on the back for good measure. “Go get ‘em.”

“You’ll be great dear,” Hannah calls from behind her.

Dani turns and smiles her thanks, accidentally catches Jamie’s eye in the process. Jamie, who’s sprawled out on one of the couches, a beer halfway to her lips.

She raises the beer in a toast of sorts. “Kill ‘em kid.”

She winks at her, and Dani carries the high of it all the way to the curtain.

\----

“Hi there,” Dani croaks, clears her throat, barrels on. “Hi there, my name’s Dani.”

An underwhelming smattering of  _ hi Dani  _ sounds up from the audience and Dani releases her first breath of the night. She grabs the mic stand between both hands, more for leverage than anything and stares out across the room.

“So I’m a housewife believe it or not,” she begins, eying the crowds carefully. “I kinda broke out of suburbia for the night to come here actually.”

There’s a prickle of laughter then, barely audible over the general din of the room but it may as well have been a standing ovation for the way it lights a fire in Dani’s stomach.

“My husband doesn’t know I’m here so I trust you all to keep my secret.” She pauses, flicks through the file-a-fax in her brain for her first good joke. “Speaking of my husband, he’s Irish. So he’s probably in a bar with a Scotish man and a Welsh man right now.”

No laugh on that one, it’s okay, move on.

“It’s not really all it’s cracked up to be, being married to an Irish man,” she continues, her knuckles white on the mic stand. “I mean on paper it seems great, nice big family to be welcomed into, always someone to have a drink with you, maybe even a heritage trip to Ireland someday…”

She licks her lips, prays this one lands.

“But then you marry him and you realise that the big family haven’t welcomed you in so much as they’ve eaten you alive y’know? I’ve gone from being an only child to having five brothers, three sisters in law, three nieces and a nephew. Never mind the extended family. Being an only child doesn’t train you to learn that many names. I’ve never had to learn that many names before!”

This one does get a laugh, she blows out another breath and smiles.

“And don’t even get me started on the drinking…”

\----

“Well, well, well…” Owen greets her with a one armed hug when she re-emerges in the dressing room. “If it isn’t our star of the hour.”

“I mean I wasn’t that funny,” Dani huffs, her hyper-critical brain already replaying all the duds. “They only laughed at like a few of my--”

“Ah, ah, we don’t do that up here…” Owen warns. “We can all go home and sulk about our dead jokes later. This,” he motions around the room, “is a safe space.”

Dani smiles gratefully. “Who’s on now anyway?”

“Jamie…” Owen guides them both to the railing again to look down on the stage. “If you’ve not heard her before then I’d advise giving her set a listen. Girl’s a genius.”

Then Hannah’s calling Owen away from her side and Dani’s left, forearms resting on the railing, looking down at the stage she’d just come off - had she really just done that? - waiting for the brunette to emerge.

\----

“Alright folks!” Jamie waves as she walks across the short stage towards the mic stand. “How we all doing?” She inquires, as she pulls the mic away from the stand and meanders about the stage.

“Good,” a few voices from the audience offer back and Jamie nods.

“Well thank god for that, certainly makes my job easier,” she deadpans, immediately earning her a ripple of laughter.

She walks about the stage a bit more, in no real rush to launch into her set. Instead she happily observes the audience, makes one or two comments on the crowd that earn her some more laughter. She gradually makes her way back to centre stage and holds the mic loosely in her hand.

“So you’re probably wondering about the accent,” she points at herself and shrugs. “Russian, believe or not. You wouldn’t believe the lengths the Soviets go to these days to infiltrate. This is actually what a Moscow accent sounds like now.”

She laughs at her own joke along with the crowd.

“Nah, seriously though I could be Russian for all I know. Spent most of my life in and out of foster care you see…” She pauses, looks out at the crowd dramatically. “It’s okay to laugh at that one by the way, all the kids in school used to laugh at me for it.”

Permission to laugh granted, and the crowd once again tear off into peels of laughter.

“So yeah, never really got acquainted with my biological parents, which isn’t all bad really. You see the great thing about having no parents - aside from the fact that you’re well on your way to becoming Batman…”

\----

By the time Jamie’s thanking the crowd and bowing off stage Dani’s sides are sore from laughing. She manages to straighten herself up just as Jamie’s re-emerging at the top of the stairs.

“That was incredible,” she gushes, as Jamie goes to move past her towards the couches.

“Thanks Poppins.” Jamie shoots her a cheeky smile as she saunters across the room.

Dani’s brow furrows. “Poppins?” She follows Jamie towards one of the couches.

“That bit in your set about how you used to be an au pair,” Jamie shrugs. “It had some real Mary Poppins potential in it.”

“You listened to my set?” Dani tries to keep her voice even, tries not to sound too hopeful that someone with talent like Jamie’s would want to listen to her jokes.

Jamie nods. “It’s not bad.”

“It didn’t get many laughs.”

“You’re not using the right material,” Jamie explains without missing a beat, reaching for a beer bottle as she speaks. “You’re funny, but you’re not playing to your strengths.”

“Oh yea?” Dani takes a seat next to her.

“Yeah, like that stuff about being an au pair?” Jamie takes a swig of her beer. “Funniest material you’ve got I think.”

“It got no laughs,” Dani reminds her.

“Because you’ve not got the right punchline yet.”

“That makes no sense…”

Jamie fishes a beaten up box of cigarettes out of her shirt pocket. “Makes perfect sense. You’ve got some real funny stories, about your life in suburbia and your husband and who you are… just haven’t figured out how to sum it up yet. How to package that world as one of your punchlines.” Jamie looks at her over her unlit cigarette. 

“Maybe I haven’t figured out how I fit in that world, never mind how my comedy might fit.”

Jamie shrugs. “Then use that.”

\----

“You’re late,” Eddie comments, when Dani shuffles in the door a few hours later.

His tone instantly cuts through the high she’s been riding on all evening. Not just a high from finally performing her jokes to a crowd that didn’t seem to hate her. But the high of being around people, for an entire evening, who didn’t seem to be looking for an excuse to judge her or bring her down.

Conversations with the people she’d met this evening had been some of the easiest conversations she’d ever had in her life. It had broken her heart a little to tell them she wouldn’t be able to go for a drink afterwards, that she had to get home to suburbia.

Jamie made her promise she’d find an excuse to stay out longer next week though,  _ even if it just means you can stay for one. _

“I got delayed,” Dani explains without looking up from the buttons of her jacket.

“You smell like smoke,” he comments then, as he steps up behind her. “Have you been smoking?”

Dani shrugs her jacket off her shoulders then turns to face him. “Some of the girls at the book club smoke.”

It worries her really. All her life she’d been told she couldn’t lie to save her life. Something about caring too much, about worrying too much about hurting other people. It worries her that she can do it so easily to Eddie now.

Eddie, the one person she shouldn’t need to lie to.

“Dirty habit for women,” Eddie comments with a huff. 

“Didn’t know mens lungs were impervious to tobacco.” She means it as a joke, even if there is a little bite behind it.

Eddie doesn’t seem the slightest bit amused. He wanders back to the living room. 

“I really would prefer if you were home when you told me you’d be home you know?” He says eventually, once he’s settled back into the couch and turned his attention back to the TV screen. “I was worried about you.”

Dani casts a glance over the beer bottles at his feet, the match on the television, the dirty dishes sitting next to him that he’d not bothered to clear up after dinner.

She sighs to herself. “I’m sure you were worried sick.”

He half turns his head. “What was that?”

She smiles at him brightly. “I said next week I’ll probably not be home until after you’re in bed. One of the girls is having a birthday so we thought we’d go for a drink afterwards as well.”

Eddie’s attention is already back on the TV screen when he grunts something vaguely resembling agreement.

\----

“Hi guys,” Dani greets warmly, letting the tension drop from her shoulders as she steps back into the dressing room of Bly Manor Bar the following Friday.

“We didn’t scare you off then?” Hannah welcomes with a smile.

“Not yet anyway.” Dani shrugs off her jacket and accepts a beer from Owen. “Thanks.”

“Thought I wouldn’t pressure you with the hard stuff this week.” He takes a seat next to Hannah.

“Back for more Poppins?” Jamie saunters across the room towards her and raises her beer bottle.

Dani taps it with the neck of her own bottle and smiles. “I like to fail at things at least twice before I call it a day.”

Jamie shakes her head, huffs out a laugh. “Something tells me you couldn’t fail at something if you tried.”

Dani smiles and Jamie winks again and oh god what is it about that wink? She clears her throat and takes a seat on the couch across from Owen and Hannah. Jamie joins her and Dani tries not to tense up too much when Jamie’s arm brushes her own.

_ You just admire her,  _ she reminds herself,  _ nothing more. _

“So,” Owen starts, once they’re all comfy and Dani’s just about bit back her panicked thoughts about Jamie. “Convince the old ball and chain to let you come out for a drink with us tonight?”

Dani can tell he doesn’t mean the nickname seriously, though she blushes anyway. “I uh- yes, yea,” she settles on, rather than explaining that Eddie has no idea where she is tonight, or where she was last week, or that it isn’t a group of perfectly respectable middle aged housewives she’s going out for a drink with.

“Oh it’ll be so nice to have another adult at the table,” Hannah says with a smile.

“Be nice to not be third wheel for once,” Jamie shoots back.

_ Just nice to be invited out with people that seem to genuinely like you,  _ Dani thinks to herself, letting the pleasant conversation wash over her and wash away any second show nerves.

\----

Her second set goes a lot better than her first. Still not many laughs. But considerably less awkward silences.

She’s cleared out a lot of jokes that didn’t work the first time round, which mostly means a shorter set.

But still, less awkward silence and a few more laughs is what she’ll take for now - maybe show three is when she starts improving.

\----

Jamie’s got an entirely new set from the week before. Incredible really, how her brain is able to churn out joke after joke.

This week she goes after the audience more, never quite picking on someone, never quite leaving them afraid that they’d be who she’d go to next, but just enough to get belly laughs all the same.

It’s incredible really, watching her work. Watching the way she smiles easily as she leads people from one joke to the next. 

\----

“So…” Jamie slides into the booth next to Dani, offers her a beer. “Why comedy?”

Dani takes the beer off her with a small smile of thanks. “Why not?” She shrugs, takes the beer bottle to her lips for a quick sip. “Thanks by the way.”

“No problem.” Jamie takes a sip of her own then studies Dani for a minute. “There must be something though, something that made you brave enough to get up on a stage in front of strangers. You don’t go into stand-up comedy because the knitting club wasn’t taking new members.”

Dani snorts out a small laugh. “No, I suppose you don’t.”

“Then why do you do it?” Jamie prompts.

Dani weighs up her options. Decides for now to keep Jamie guessing. Decides stories of a confused girl meeting a confused boy and helping the boy figure himself out while she remained confused weren’t stories for a first drink together. That stories of a marriage held together by nothing but a thread of carefully woven lies wasn’t a story she told new friends. 

“The money?” She offers instead, feeling very smug and a little something else when Jamie throws her head back in a rumble of laughter.

“See,” Jamie smiles at her fondly. “Told you you’re funny.”

“You’re just being nice.” Dani tries her hardest not to smile too hard.

“And who could blame me for wanting to be nice to you?” Jamie’s smile is soft and it feels just a little bit dangerous.

Dani glances away before she can get too lost in the delicate curl of Jamie’s lips, looks instead at Owen and Hannah, sitting across from them in the booth. “How long have they?” She motions between the pair, lost entirely in their own conversation.

“Oh they’re not.” Jamie smirks when Dani shoots her a disbelieving look. “I know yeah. They’re both just idiots I guess.” Jamie shrugs. “Or they love one another too much to take the chance of losing it.”

Dani hums. “I’d take the chance. If I met someone that made me as happy as that, I’d take the chance.” 

It’s only when Jamie doesn’t respond right away and Dani looks across at her to catch her confused expression that Dani realises she’s said anything wrong at all.

“Poppins, thought you were married?” She’s sure Jamie means for it to sound teasing but Dani can’t help but wonder if it also sounds just a little bit curious.

“Well I mean- I-I am. I’m married. I just- just--”

“Think we might be getting a little closer to your  _ why  _ there Poppins,” Jamie teases around the rim of her bottle, her eyes twinkling when she takes another swig.

Dani blushes, clears her throat and takes a swig of her own. Tries her absolute best to forget the past minute or so ever happened.

It’s easier said than done though. As Owen and Hannah emerge from one another's eyes and re-join the conversation, and as the night winds on happily, Dani can’t help but play over and over the twinkle in Jamie’s eyes and the curiosity in her tone.

She could be overthinking it, but then every time Jamie’s looked at her all evening that same twinkle has still been there. And Dani can’t exactly say she hasn’t been looking too. Desperate for one more glance from Jamie, one more chance to diserpher what it means.

And that same curiosity is there when Dani gets up from the table a few hours later, suddenly having noticed the time on the clock behind the bar.

“You’re not heading back to suburbia already, are you Poppins?”

Dani’s already shoving her hands roughly into her jacket. “Gotta. Gonna miss the last train.” God knows she wasn’t going to be able to afford a taxi from the city with what little she had left of her twenty dollar fee for the night.

“See you next week?” Owen offers.

Dani nods. “Couldn’t keep me away.” She grabs her bag. “See you then.”

“Wait,” Jamie reaches out, brushes her fingers along Dani’s wrist though she doesn’t quite grab it. “I’ll walk you.”

Dani pauses mid-step. “You sure?”

Jamie nods, grabs her jacket. “Lead the way.” She turns back to Hannah and Owen. “I’ll be right back.”

Dani doesn’t quite catch Hannah’s response to that, Jamie’s already leading her out of the bar towards the street. 

The majority of the walk is silent, though Dani finds she doesn’t mind it so much with Jamie. At home, with Eddie, the silence seems deafening, even though he’s always got the TV on to drown it out. Here though, with nothing but Jamie’s quiet humming to break through the muted calm of the city between them, the silence feels like floating.

Before long Dani finds herself humming along to whatever tune Jamie’s got stuck in her head and soon enough they’re singing quietly to one another. Then Jamie catches Dani’s eye and they’re both giggling, singing with one another in earnest now, both of them completely out of tune.

“What’s the name of that song again?” Dani giggles once they’ve butchered the final few lines.

“How dare you,” Jamie gasps, taking a dramatic leap back. “That’s Blondie!”

“Oh,” it clicks with Dani, “Heart of Glass.”

“Damn right,” Jamie huffs. “Thought I was going to have to push you in front of the train.”

They come to a stop and Dani realises they are in fact standing outside Dani’s station. “Thanks for walking me,” she offers, for want of something more to say.

“No problem.” Jamie shrugs. “What you doing tomorrow?”

“Uh…” Dani pauses, thinks for a second. “Well I usually clean the house on Saturdays.”

Jamie barks out a laugh. “Now that right there’s the best joke you’ve told yet.” She smiles to let Dani know she means nothing by the comment, then continues. “You’re coming with me tomorrow.”

“I- where?”

“It’s a surprise,” Jamie teases. “Just say yes.”

“I- I mean…”

“Dani…”

And something tells Dani she should say no. That agreeing to spend the day with Jamie tomorrow is a bad idea. But for the first time since Jamie’s met her she’s just called her Dani instead of Poppins, and for some reason that does something to Dani’s heart. Something that makes it impossible for her to refuse the brunette.

“Yes.” Dani nods once. “Okay, yes.”

Jamie smiles, begins backing away from her slowly. “Okay cool. I’ll meet you here,” she points to the train station entrance. “Eleven tomorrow morning.”

“Eleven,” Dani agrees, nodding again then watching Jamie disappear into the crowd.

She makes her train by the skin of her teeth.

\----

“I just don’t see why we can’t spend today together?” Eddie huffs, lifting his hands so Dani can clear his plate.

“I told you.” Dani scrapes what’s left of his breakfast into the bin. “I’m going into the city to meet a friend.”

“What friend? Since when do you have friends in the city?” Eddie pulls forward his mug of coffee and drains the last gulp from the cup. “We always spend Saturday in the house together.”

Dani coughs back a laugh. “I spend my Saturday cleaning and you spend it in front of the TV,” she reminds him.

“Yea, well…” And at the very least Eddie has the good sense to look bashful now. “At least we’re together.”

Dani smiles at him, smiles because it’s the only thing she can do to swallow the anger sitting in her throat. “I’ll not be out late.”

“You promise?” Eddie pushes. “Jeopardy’s on tonight, I thought we could watch it together.”

“I promise,” Dani agrees through gritted teeth.

She wipes his plate in the sink then places it on the draining board with the rest of the dishes. She towels off her hands and turns around to him.

“Now I really should go, I told my friend I’d meet her at eleven,” she explains, unknotting her apron.

“Who is this friend anyway?” Eddie asks, getting up and following her when she leaves the kitchen.

“Oh, uh- someone from college,” Dani offers, not looking back over her shoulder as she weaves through the living room to the front door.

“I didn’t know you kept in touch with anyone from college?” Eddie presses, hovering next to her as she reaches for her jacket.

“We just got back in touch,” Dani explains. “I bumped into her one day last week.”

“She lives around here then?”

Dani closes her eyes for a second, tries not to get worked up. “She was just visiting I think,” she elaborates with all the gentle calm of someone ready to explode. “I’m sure I’ll find out when I’m talking to her properly.”

“What’s her name?” Eddie’s not done, and Dani’s all but reached her breaking point.

“Jamie,” she sighs. “Now if you’re done with your game of twenty questions I really do need to--” she motions towards the door.

Eddie holds his hands up defensively. “I’m only taking an interest. You’re always asking me to take more of an interest,” he jokes. “Jamie… bit of a boyish name is it not?”

Dani shoots him a glare. “What exactly does that mean?”

“Nothing, nothing. Just wondering if all of your late night book club meetings and--”

“Jamie’s a girl,” Dani spits back before he has a chance to go on. “A woman in fact. Not that the gender of my friends should matter to you.” She zips up her jacket in a rough tug. “Not that it’s any of your business at all in fact.”

“I’m your husband Danielle, of course it’s my business!”

“It’s the eighties Eddie, not the twenties, you don’t get to decide who I spend my time with.”

Eddie, once again, raises his hands in defeat. “Just want to make sure you’re okay. That we’re okay.”

Dani sighs, runs a hand through her hair. “I’m fine. We’re fine,” she lies easily - the easiest lies were always the ones most often told. “Though I really do need to go if I want to get my train.”

“Sure, yea, sure…” Eddie motions towards the door. “Go on.”

Dani turns on her heel, though Eddie’s voice just about stops her as she reaches for the door handle. 

“Just don’t forget you can’t do bookclub next friday, we’ve Mr. Wingrave from the firm coming over for dinner.”

Dani nods, not really paying him much attention. “Sure, no problem,” she obliges, not in the least bit interested in starting another conversation while she’s on her way out. “I’ll make a roast.”

\----

“Rough morning then?” Jamie sing-songs as they meander down the busy city streets to an as of yet undisclosed location.

Dani had been late getting to the train station, though Jamie was still standing there waiting on her. A smile on her face that didn’t let away whether or not she was worried that she’d been stood up. Dani had just about finished with her apologies, all of them having been regurgitated in quick succession from the second she’d spotted Jamie’s delicate frame at the station entrance.

“You could say that,” Dani hums, her eyes cast out on the footpath ahead of her so as not to give anything away.

“You wanna talk about it?” Jamie offers, with a gentle nudge in the shoulder that makes Dani smile in spite of herself.

“Just an argument with my husband.” The honesty of her statement shocks her, the fact that it’s Jamie she’s being honest with shocks her a little less for some reason.

“Worried about who was going to clean the house, was he?” Jamie teases.

Dani huffs out a laugh. “You’re not far off actually.” Dani turns to Jamie, laughs a little more at the way her face is scrunched up in disgust.

“And what’s he doing on a Saturday that makes him too busy to give the place a once over?” Jamie spits.

And Dani knows this is the part where she should defend Eddie. The part where she tells Jamie that’s none of her business. That Eddie’s a good man who works hard Monday to Friday to put food on the table. That he’s gone through the paces to get himself a promotion so as when she’s ready she can quit her job and start a family with him. That he deserves a rest on a Saturday if he wants one.

None of those things come out of her mouth. None of those things that she’s convinced herself of since they got married a year ago really seem to hold any merit with Jamie’s shoulder bumping against hers, and Jamie’s angry question bumping around in her head.

“Well I mean the TV doesn’t watch itself Jamie,” Dani offers with an almost bitter laugh.

Jamie gives her a sideways glance, smiles just a little. “Use that. In your set, use it. A little less angry than the way you just said it to me, but use it. That’s the stuff that’s real. It’s the stuff that’ll get you laughs.”

“You’re saying all the stuff you use is real?” Dani asks. “The stuff about the foster homes and- well--”

“Not knowing who my parents are?” Jamie supplies.

Dani nods. “Maybe that’s too personal a question, forget I asked.” 

Jamie just shrugs. “Not too personal for me to get up on stage every night and tell jokes about it.” She glances at Dani, smiles. “Between you and me I did know them, at least for a while. When I was too little to really remember properly maybe, but I did know them.”

“What were they like?” Dani asks in spite of herself.

Jamie looks at her, scrunches her nose. “Not the best.”

Dani laughs softly because she feels it’s the best thing to do. Moves on as well because she also senses that’s the best thing to do.

“So really you’re saying I should take from my real life but twist it until it’s funny?”

Jamie nods. “Otherwise it’s just an ill advised therapy session.”

Dani hums in an agreeable sort of way then is brought to an abrupt stop by Jamie’s hand around her wrist. She glances back at Jamie, then up at the sign for the train station above their heads.

“Where are you taking me?” Dani asks, allowing herself to be dragged through the entrance and down the steps.

“What part of surprise don’t you understand?” Jamie shoots back over her shoulder, adding a cheeky grin that Dani can’t argue with.

“This is starting to feel a whole lot more like a kidnapping than a surprise,” Dani warns, though she follows diligently up to the ticket booth.

“Hey, you’re free to walk away whenever you’d like,” Jamie offers with a shrug.

Dani smiles and motions for Jamie to order the tickets.

\----

“How many more stops?” Dani asks, glancing across at Jamie who’s sitting next to her on the bench.

Jamie shrugs. “Haven’t really been paying attention. Two or three I think?” She glances at Dani, smiles. “I’ll know the stop when we come up to it though.”

“How reassuring.”

Jamie’s smile just grows. “So, tell me about your life Dani Clayton.”

“What’s there to tell?” Dani grimaces a little. “I’m a suburban housewife trying to forge a comedy career.”

“In itself that’s funny,” Jamie notes. “Though I know there’s more to you than that.” She turns fully to Dani now. “You’re married, and your husband’s Irish, we know that much.”

“Well, of Irish descent,” Dani corrects. “I mean his parents were born here, and most of his grandparents were born here so I don’t think that really counts. Otherwise I could claim I’m English on account of my surname.”

“Okay see that,” Jamie jabs her lightly in the arm. “That right there’s the makings of a joke. Him claiming his ancestry even though his link to the homeland is dubious at best.”

“What’s the joke?”

Jamie pauses for a moment, considers it. “Not sure, but there’s one in there.” She looks back at Dani. “Okay so what else?”

“Oh god I don’t know…” Dani pauses, considers it. “I’m a grade school teacher. Fourth grade to be exact.”

“Loads of material in that!” Jamie looks excited now. “And what else? What about family? Family’s always good.”

Dani pauses, worries her bottom lip between her teeth a little, weighing up the pros and cons of continuing. “Well I don’t talk to my mom that much. Not when I can help it anyway. And uh- and dad died when I was a kid, so not much new material on him I guess.” She laughs weakly.

“Okay,” Jamie nods, her expression suddenly more serious than it had been a few moments earlier. “No mum or dad content then. I can see that might be a sticking point.”

“No, no I don’t mean...” Dani scrambles to make up for the awkward air she can feel settling. “I’m not trying to play the pity card or anything I just don’t- don’t talk about it that often I guess or, or…”

Jamie’s hand over her forearm puts an end to her rushed apology.

“I’m not trying to make you uncomfortable here Poppins. And me asking that clearly made you uncomfortable, so let's forget about it, yeah?” She smiles and Dani feels a weight lift off her shoulders. “You don’t wanna use it in your set, well guess what? We don’t use it in your set. I just wanna help, I don’t want to make you talk about, or think about, anything you don’t want to, okay.”

Dani nods once, Jamie squeezes her forearm then lifts her hand away.

“Okay so what else then?” She jumps right back into it. “What about we circle back to that husband of yours? What does he do for a living?”

“Eh, insurance salesman.”

Jamie grimaces. “Oh, nothing funny in that.” She thinks for a moment. “Okay well what about your love story. There can always be something funny in a love story.”

Dani pauses to think, then pauses some more. Then realizes she’s maybe paused for too long when Jamie gives her a look that says  _ well? _

“I don’t know that there is really,” she admits eventually. “We were friends when we were kids and then at some point or another I felt bad for turning him down when he asked me out so I agreed. Then I felt bad for turning him down when he proposed so I agreed. Then I felt bad for telling him no when he tried to set a date for the wedding so I agreed to one and now here I am.”

“Ah, I see,” Jamie hums, and Dani can see the cogs ticking over in her brain as she tries to workout the punchline. “Classic case of Romeo and Juliet then so.”

Dani snorts. “Now that’s funny.”

“Well it’s yours for free if you want it.” She glances at Dani. “Our stop’s next up by the way. Told you I’d know when it was coming.”

\----

“Okay so maybe I took us off a stop early,” Jamie laments for what’s maybe the third time since she’d gotten her bearings again outside the train station. “But hey, walking is good for you, right?”

Dani huffs out a breath. “I’m not exactly in my walking shoes, am I?”

Jamie glances down at the brogues Dani’s wearing, winces a little. “You want a piggy-back ride?”

Dani snorts. “You couldn’t carry me!”

“Could too!” Jamie hunkers down a little, daring her. “I could at least carry you a block.”

“Could not,” Dani counters, hates admitting to herself that she’d love to see Jamie in action.

“Hop on Poppins.”

“No way.”

Jamie pats her back. “Hop on or I’m going to stand hunkered over like this for the rest of the day and you’ll never know where I was taking you.”

Dani rolls her eyes. “You’re impossible.”

She steps up anyway, gingerly positions herself behind Jamie then hops up until Jamie’s arms have purchase under her kneecaps and her own arms have a grip around Jamie’s shoulders.

“Comfy?” Jamie asks, already straightening up and starting off down the street, ignoring the glances from passers-by.

“Worried,” Dani corrects, telling herself that’s the reason she pulls herself even tighter to Jamie’s body - nothing more, nothing less.

It feels good, she has to admit. Setting off down the street on Jamie’s back, laughing at the comments Jamie makes to the people that stare at them as they pass -  _ she broke both her ankles in a tragic water polo accident. _ She’s laughing so hard at Jamie’s commentary and her own realisation of the absurdness of the situation that she barely notices when they reach their destination. 

Though all of a sudden Jamie’s lowering her carefully off her back, setting her down in front of the doors of a hospital. 

“My lady,” Jamie offers with an exaggerated bow. “We have reached our destination.”

Dani looks up at the hospital sign, then back down at Jamie. “Are we… visiting someone?”

A comedy icon perhaps? A weird ghost from Jamie’s past that scared her into pursuing a career in stand up?

“No, we’re here to do a gig,” Jamie offers with a laugh. “Or at least I’m here to do a gig,” she corrects when she sees the horror that streaks across Dani’s face. “Wouldn’t spring one on you that last minute.”

“Oh…” Dani glances up at the sign again, “you do gigs in places like this often?”

Jamie shrugs. “I mean I don’t get paid or anything. It’s just a good place to hone the craft as it were.” She glances at Dani, sees that Dani sees through the reasoning. “And it’s nice to be nice. To give back and all that. Make people laugh that might be having a shitty day otherwise.”

Dani hums. “Glad there’s more to it than personal gain.”

“Oh yeah?” Jamie leads them in through the sliding doors towards reception. “Hey, I’m Jamie, here to do a stand up set?”

“In the common room, down the hall and it’s your second left.” The receptionist offers with a friendly smile.

Jamie obliges and Dani follows. “Yea,” she offers, once they’re almost at the doors. “Makes you more likeable.” 

Jamie turns to her and grins. “Glad my plan’s working then.”

\----

“Okay so you sir, you sir, you’ve had a question all evening, so what is it?”

Dani glances at the man Jamie’s questioning now. A guy with his entire arm in a cast, propped up on brackets that makes him look as if he’s raising his hand to ask a question.

“I don’t have a question,” he chuckles, the laughter echoed through the rest of the room.

“Oh well then- oh… OH…” Jamie pauses dramatically, assesses him as she allows the laughter to die down. “So what happened there then? Get run over while you were hailing a taxi?”

The entire room erupts into laughter.

\----

“That was incredible,” Dani gushes, coming up to Jamie just as she finishes signing her last cast.

“This your friend?” Dani notes it’s the guy from earlier, the guy who had in fact been hit while looking for a cab, though not while hailing one. 

“Uh yea, yea,” Dani nods, a little thrill shooting through her at the thought of her and Jamie being more than just mere acquaintances. 

“She’s gonna make it big someday,” he nods seriously. “Real big.”

“I don’t doubt it for a second.” Dani smiles at him and then he’s being helped away by a nurse and it’s just her and Jamie left standing in the middle of the emptying common room.

“You want an autograph too?” Jamie shoots her a teasing grin.

Dani melts.

“I don’t have a cast though,” she points.

Jamie shrugs. “We’ll work something out.”

She grabs a pamphlet from the coffee table next to them and flips it over. She puts her sharpie between her lips and pulls it away from the lid. Then she hunkers over the coffee table and glances up again at Dani.

“Who should I make it out to?”

Dani smiles. “How about your biggest fan?”

“Some tough competition for that title Poppins, you’re not even wearing my merch.”

Dani quirks her brow. “You’ve got merch?” 

“No,” Jamie admits, “though if you were my biggest fan I’m sure you’d have fashioned some to give out at fan club meetings.”

“Ah I see, well that’s the thing,” Dani explains, “we’re actually having trouble getting the numbers to attend meetings.”

“Oh yeah?”

Dani nods. “One time we even had this guy get hit by a cab trying to make it to one.”

Jamie snorts, shakes her head, looks back down at the pamphlet on the table. “How about I just start writing and you tell me later if I did a good job?”

“I can live with that compromise.”

Dani tries to peek over Jamie’s shoulder as she leans in to scribble something across the back of the pamphlet then, though she keeps her shoulders bowed low to prevent any stolen glances and so eventually Dani just leans back. Worries her bottom lip between her teeth and waits for Jamie to finish what appears to be a short essay.

When she is done she straightens up again and lifts the pamphlet with her, folding it once and tucking it into the breast pocket of her shirt before turning back to Dani.

“Isn’t it traditional for you to give the autograph to the person that requested it once you’re done?” Dani points.

Jamie shrugs, starts walking back towards the exit. “I’m not big on tradition.”

Dani takes a few quick steps then falls into place next to Jamie. “So I just never get to see what you wrote?”

“Now, now, ye of little faith,” Jamie skips out the front doors of the hospital. 

“So I do get it then?” Dani runs a little to catch up with her once more, laughing softly at how light and playful Jamie seems after her show.

“How about this?” Jamie stops her skipping abruptly, turns back to face Dani. “One more stop, then I’ll give it to you?”

Dani glances down at her watch and her stomach gives a worried little jolt. She’d need to leave now if she wanted to make it home in time to watch Jeopardy with Eddie. 

“If you can’t no worries,” Jamie rushes, not missing Dani’s brief panic. “I’ll just hold on to this until next time I see you.”

“So it’s just an insurance policy to spend more time with me one way or another then, is it?” Dani looks back up at Jamie, still half torn on whether or not to stay.

“Can you blame me?” There’s a twinkle in Jamie’s eyes when she asks it, one that puts an end to any debate Dani may still be having.

“I’ll go with you,” Dani tells her, almost breathlessly. 

“You sure?”

Dani nods, clears her throat. “I want to spend today with you,” she reasures her. “So lead the way.”

\----

“Where--” Dani looks up as Jamie leads them into a dingy looking little cafe. “Where is this?”

Jamie glaces back over her shoulder, grinning. “This, Poppins, is the best hot meal you’re going to get in this city.”

The bell above the door alerts the person behind the counter to their arrival, and when he looks up Dani realises it’s Owen.

“Ladies,” he greets warmly, whatever he’d been doing previously instantly forgotten. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Not sure,” Dani admits, though Jamie just shoots her another smile and saunters up to the counter.

“We hear you do the best carbonara outside of Italy, that right Sharma?” She leans against the counter, up on her tip-toes Dani notices.

It makes her heart summersault against her rib cage.

“It’s gotten its fair share of compliments,” Owen agrees with a nod. “You want the real good stuff though...” he leans across the counter, beckons for her and Dani to both lean in closer. “You’ve not lived until you’ve tried my bolognese.”

Dani laughs, tries not to get too caught up in the way Jamie’s arm brushes hers when the brunette leans back from the counter again.

“Alright then I’ll give it a go.” Jamie turns to Dani. “You want the same?”

“You’re buying me dinner?” Dani scrunches her brow.

“You’ve indulged me all day Poppins. Let me drag you half ways across the city and back again,” Jamie reminds her. “Least I can do is put food in your belly.”

Owen leans over to them again. “Trust me, this method of putting food in your belly is far preferable to Jamie cooking for you herself.”

“Oi,” Jamie swats at his arm. “I’ve managed not to poison myself haven’t I?”

Owen grins, leans back to his side of the counter. “Not the self-praise you think it is.” He shoos them. “Now go, go sit. Let a man work.”

Dani lets Jamie lead her to one of the booths in the back, right next to the window. The place has a real roadside diner feel to it, even though it looks out over the bustling Bly High Street. The worn red leather of the booth squeaks when Dani slides in. Jamie bounces across the bench opposite her.

“So…” Dani pulls one of the napkins towards her, starts fiddling with it between her fingers.

“So…” Jamie echoes, eying Dani up boldly as she reclines back into the soft leather.

Dani doesn’t really know what she wants to say if she’s honest. Just that she wants to say it to Jamie. She’s never felt like this before. She’s never met someone she’s connected with so instantly, someone she wants to share all of herself with. Someone she could sit with and talk about nothing and everything all at the same time.

She knows there’s something more too. Something bigger than just the desire to talk to Jamie. Something about the way Jamie looks at her that makes her skin feel too small for her body. Makes her feel like she might implode at any second. Something about the way her entire body tingles when Jamie walks into a room, when Jamie tells a joke and looks at Dani to see if she’s laughing. It’s something big.

Guilt twists in her stomach. She swallows it down, smiles.

“So you bring girls here often?” She settles on finally.

She’s guessing of course. She realises as soon as she says it that she’s got no actual proof of Jamie’s sexuality. That it’s only ever been her own marriage they’ve talked about. Jamie could have a husband and three kids waiting for her at home for all Dani knows.

So she’s not sure why she asks it - wishful thinking she supposes.

“You calling me a player?” Jamie doesn’t sound offended and Dani likes the way her eyes twinkle, daring her to go on.

Dani shakes her head, laughs a little. “I’m just curious.”

“Oh really?” This all feels so dangerous, Dani’s entire body thrills.

“Really.”

Jamie rests her hand on the linoleum table top. Studies Dani for a few seconds as her fingers rap against it in a gentle rhythm. Dani wants to look away but can’t. Instead she just watches Jamie watching her, the seconds seeming to stretch out into an eternity in the quiet space between them.

“It’s a dangerous thing to be curious about.” Jamie settles on finally.

Dani wants to tell her she knows that. Wants to scream at her that her life has always been so safe, so structured, so well planned and well timed that all she really craves is a little danger. Especially danger that comes in the form of Jamie’s easy smile and kind eyes.

She doesn’t get a chance to though, because all of a sudden Owen’s at their table, two plates and a smile shattering the resolve of the moment.

“Here we go,” he puts the plates down in front of them. “Now be honest about it, unless you don’t like it. Then lie to me.”

“I’m sure it’s lovely Owen,” Dani offers with a smile, cutting short whatever comment Jamie had been just about to make.

“Thank you Dani,” Owen turns to Jamie, points. “See why can’t you be more like her?”

Jamie snorts. “What, and have that ego of yours inflate until you can’t fit through doors? Not a chance mate.”

Owen shakes his head. “The shit I have to put up with.” He turns back to Dani. “A drink for my favourite customer?”

“Eh… I’ll have a water I guess?”

Owen smiles at her. “A beer it is then.”

Dani laughs a little. Wants to tell him that it’s not in her best interest to go home late and drunk. But then Jamie’s saying  _ make that two beers  _ and she’s casting a little sideways smile at Dani and fuck it. Eddie was already going to be mad, wasn’t he?

“So…” Jamie turns back to her once Owen’s left to fetch their drinks. “You want to try this?”

And Dani knows she’s talking about the food. Doesn’t matter though.

She looks Jamie in the eye, smiles a little. “I do, yea.” 

Hopes Jamie understands.

\----

There’s a pleasant buzz in Dani’s head and a pleasant fullness in her stomach. The night air is cool against her skin when Owen finally kicks them out, though she doesn’t feel the cold of it.

Not with Jamie’s shoulder bumping her own, their fingers, dangling between them, grazing occasionally though never quite committing to a hold.

“We should probably get you home,” Jamie offers, instinctually leading them towards Dani’s station.

“What if I don’t want to go home?” It feels bold of her to say, but Dani’s felt bold all day.

Jamie smiles at her, avoids the question. “I’ve a gig tomorrow,” she tells her instead, “it’s part of an open-mic night. I’d like you to come with me and perform.”

“You-- really?”

Jamie nods. “Really, really.”

“But I’ve not practiced any of my material, or- or written any new jokes or--” They’re at the train station now, so Jamie stops her in her tracks.

“You’re not gonna need any of that,” she explains, reaching out and grabbing Dani’s shoulders. “You don’t need a script Poppins. You’re funny, that’s all you need.”

“Easy for you to--” Jamie squeezes her shoulders once and Dani falls silent.

“I know you’re funny,” Jamie tells her with a certainty that makes Dani want to believe it. “So meet me here tomorrow at six.”

“Tomorrow at six,” Dani echoes, a swell of nerves sitting tight in her chest.

Jamie smiles, confident she’s convinced her, and she lets go of her shoulders. It feels cold where her hands had just been resting.

“Oh, almost forgot…” Jamie pulls the pamphlet from her pocket, presents it to Dani still folded in half so as to hide her note.

Dani takes it off her gingerly. As if at any moment it’s liable to explode in between her fingers. Lets her hand ghost over Jamie’s when she grabs it, lets the pads of her fingers brush across her knuckles.

“Thanks.” She doesn’t open it right away, just stares down at where their hands had just met.

Jamie nudges her back to reality. “You’re gonna miss that train of yours Poppins.”

\----

Two stops from home she unfolds the pamphlet, stares down at the scribbled cursive. Traces her fingers across the words.

_ Poppins, _

_ People come up to me every now and then and tell me that I’m going to make it big someday. That I’m gonna hit the big time. I always wondered what that would feel like - getting something you’ve wanted for so long.  _

_ Then I met you. _

_ Now I think I might know what that feels like. _

_ Your biggest fan, Jamie _

Dani reads and re-reads it all the way to her stop. Then she tucks it carefully inside her purse. Feels like she’s floating the whole way to her front door.

\----

“You missed Jeopardy,” Eddie tells her when she steps into the livingroom.

“I did, I know I’m--”

Eddie waves off her apology. “Doesn’t matter.” He gets up from the couch and shuffles past her. “I made lasagna, your favourite. It’s in the fridge, you probably need to reheat it.”

A nauseating wave of guilt sinks into the pit of her stomach.

What is she doing?

\----

“Listen, Eddie, about last night--”

“Danielle, really it’s fine.”

It’s not fine though. Dani had gone to bed to find that Eddie wasn’t in it. He’d slept in the guest room and Dani had been up since five cleaning the house and preparing breakfast, anything to not see him look like a puppy that had just been kicked.

“I just lost track of time and--”

“Jeopardy's on like all the time, we can watch it some other evening.” He sits down across from her, doesn’t quite meet her eye.

She points down at the table. “I made pancakes, your favourite.”

His smile doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “Thanks.”

She wants to fix this, she really does, and she’s not sure what that means. Not sure of what anything means when she’s with Eddie. As much as he annoys her, and as much as he’s changed from that sweet boy she met when she was eight years old, she hates to see him hurting like this. It kills her to know that she caused this sadness.

She’s not sure if that means she loves him or not.

For a long time it was enough. Not wanting to break his heart for a long time had been enough to convince Dani that she loved him. You don’t hurt the people that you love.

Now though, now there’s a note burning a hole in her purse that feels more like love than twenty years with Eddie ever had.

She doesn’t know what any of it means.

“You’re still okay to come to family dinner today?” Eddie asks over the rim of his mug.

“Of course.” She blanches a little. “I uh- I might need to leave a little early though, if that’s alright?”

Eddie looks up from his plate. “Are you serious?”

“I told my friend I’d go with her to an appointment,” she lies easily.

“Couldn’t she go with someone else?” Eddie huffs. “I’ve not seen you all weekend. Mom’s not seen you in weeks.”

Dani could give in. Tell him he’s right, tell him she’ll stay. It all seems so disingenuous though. Pacifying him like that when she knows she’ll spend the whole evening thinking about Jamie if she doesn’t get to see her.

She doesn’t want to hurt him, doesn’t want to break his heart. One thing she’s starting to realise though is that she’s not quite ready to break her own heart either.

“I’m sorry, but I told her I’d go with her. She’s depending on me.”

\----

“I wasn’t sure you were gonna show up.” Jamie stands from the bench outside the station to greet Dani with a sidewards grin.

“I wasn’t sure either to be honest,” Dani admits, her lips twitching nervously.

“Everything alright Poppins?” And just like that Jamie seems to see right through her, seems to understand the tired look in Dani’s eyes and the quiet desperation to have someone ask her that.

“No,” she tells her. “Not really.”

They set off walking. 

“You wanna talk about it?”

“I don’t know that I can with--” Dani pauses, worries her lip between her teeth. “With you,” she finishes eventually, too scared to look Jamie in the eye.

“Do you trust me?” Jamie asks, and it’s not what Dani had been expecting her to ask.

“Of course.” She glances up at her. “Of course I trust you.”

Jamie nods. “That means it’s about me then.”

“What?” Dani’s eyes go wide, though Jamie seems just as calm as always.

“Well the way I see it, you either can’t tell me what’s going on because you don’t trust me with your secrets, or because it’s a secret about me.” She looks at Dani. “Am I close?”

“I mean I- I- I... yea,” she admits eventually, her shoulders sagging in defeat. “Yea I suppose that’s why.”

“Have I done something wrong? Have I hurt you?” Jamie seems genuinely concerned now and it breaks Dani’s heart.

“You could never hurt me Jamie,” Dani tells her seriously. “Please don’t ever think you could hurt me.”

“Then what?” Jamie pushes, as she leads them off the main road and down a side street Dani doesn’t recognise.

Dani looks at her seriously for a moment. “I’m scared I’m going to hurt you,” she admits quietly.

“You could never--”

“I could Jamie,” Dani cuts her off. “And I never want to, but I could. I’m married.”

“I know.” Jamie sounds almost defensive now.

In spite of her better judgement Dani reaches down and grabs her hand clumsily. She slots their fingers together seamlessly and looks down.

“I’m married to a man who’s heart I’m slowly breaking.” She brushes her thumb across Jamie’s knuckles. “Every day I’m breaking his heart a little more, all because I-” she falters, clears her throat. “All because I can’t love him the way he loves me.”

She glances up at Jamie. Jamie who just smiles softly and squeezes her hand.

“And that’s a messy thing,” she continues. “It’s a messy thing that I haven’t figured out yet. I’m also not sure that I’m going to figure it out at all before it’s too late. And I think-” she takes a breath, steadies herself. “I think you know that you’re part of the reason it’s so hard for me to figure it out. You’re why it’s so hard for me to do the right thing.”

“What is the right thing?” Jamie asks softly.

“Quitting comedy, quitting my teaching job. Settling down and popping out some babies for him while he climbs the corporate ladder.”

“The clean the house on a Saturday life,” Jamie summarises. 

Dani nods. “Sounds easy, doesn’t it?”

“Sounds awful.”

Dani laughs and Jamie laughs too, if for no other reason than to lift some of the tension.

“So did you come here today to tell me this is it?” Jamie enquires then. “Come here to break my heart instead?” She doesn’t sound mad though, doesn’t even sound hurt, just accepting of whatever it is Dani’s mind has settled on.

Dani looks at her, bites her lip. “Well see that’s my problem, isn’t it?” She explains with a little sigh. “The reason this is all so hard. I don’t want to do the right thing Jamie, I want to do the thing that makes me happy.”

“And that would be…” Jamie trails off suggestively.

Dani rolls her eyes, curses Jamie’s ability to make her smile. “You know fine well.”

“Be nice to hear you say it.” Jamie shrugs, coming to a stop.

Dani turns to face her fully. “You’re impossible,” she scolds. “Though you are also-- wait, are we at a gay bar?”

A neon sign behind Jamie’s head catches her eye. It’s a dark building, aside from the strip of neon pointing them towards the door and the rainbow flags that can be spotted through the windows.

“For someone having a hard time figuring stuff out you sure caught on to that one fast.”

Dani swats her arm. “Shut up.” She looks up at the building again. “What’re we doing here exactly?”

“Thought you told me to shut up?”

Dani glares at her. “Keep that up and you’ll be making my decision a lot easier,” she warns.

Jamie grins. “This is where the gig is,” she explains. “Plus I figured you’ve probably not been to one before so in the spirit of you figuring things out, this seemed ideal.”

“I’ve been to a gay bar before,” Dani shoots back defensively.

“Oh yeah?” Jamie quirks her brow. “When?”

“For my hen party…”

Jamie snorts. “And that wasn’t a red flag, no?”

Dani rolls her eyes. “Can we just go in now?”

\----

As it turns out Jamie’s more of the MC for the show than an actual performer. She does a quick five minute routine at the start to warm the crowds up and then kicks things off with the first performer of the night - a drag queen, because of course.

Between each act she weaves her way through the smattering of tables to sit with Dani. It’s not gone unnoticed to Dani that girls have tried slipping her their phone numbers each time she’s made the commute from the stage to her side.

Each time though she pulls her chair in closer to Dani’s than is strictly necessary, and throws her arm across the back of Dani’s chair as they watch the show. And each time Dani’s fingers twitch with the desire to reach out and kiss her.

The thought of it is the only thing saving her from being completely overwhelmed by nerves.

“You’re up next Poppins,” Jamie whispers against her ear. “And if you remember one thing while you’re up there? Remember not to be afraid to go off script.”

Then she’s gone, back towards the stage to clap off the last act and take back the mic.

“Alright ladies and gays, big round of applause for that.” She pauses the appropriate length of time, meets Dani’s eye in the crowd. “Now I want you to give a very warm welcome to our next act. It’s her first time here, though don’t worry, she has my seal of approval so you know she’s something special.”

Jamie smiles at her, all warm and soft, and Dani melts.

“Please, give a big gay welcome to Dani Clayton.”

Dani’s on her feet before her nerves have a chance to stop her. She holds Jamie’s gaze the whole way to the stage, smiles softly and accepts the mic off her, not missing the way Jamie’s hand squeezes her wrist gently as she pulls away.

She faces out into the crowd, clears her throat. Realises her head is completely empty.

“Well hi there.” She waves a little awkwardly. “I’ll be honest, I’m a little overwhelmed,” she admits.

“What, never been to a gay bar before?” Someone - Jamie, Dani realises - heckles from the crowd.

“I have actually. Once before,” Dani relays their story from earlier with a fond smile. “For my hen-do actually.” She pauses dramatically, looks out across the room. “So no prizes for guessing how that marriage is going.”

A ripple of laughter, louder than any laugh she’s gotten before. She glances back to Jamie quickly in the crowd, sees her nod once with a smile.

Dani nods back, blows out a breath.  _ Go off script. _

“I am still married though. He’s an insurance salesman. I know, I know I wish he did something funnier too. Or god at least something that I could have a conversation with him about without falling asleep…”

\----

“Oh my god,” Dani gasps breathlessly. “Oh my god I actually did that!”

Jamie laughs, pulls her in for a quick hug. “You alright Poppins?”

“I actually did that!” Dani repeats in awe, leaning back just far enough to meet Jamie’s eye.

Jamie nods. “Yup. Killed it too.”

“I did, didn’t I?” She releases a shaky breath and pulls Jamie in for another hug. Thank you,” she mutters against the side of her neck. “Thank you.”

Jamie runs her hand up the centre of Dani’s back, tangles her fingers in through the hair at the base of Dani’s scalp and holds her close. “That was all you Poppins. That was all you, no need to thank me.”

They stand like that for a moment then. Dani’s hands stroking random patterns on Jamie’s back while Jamie’s fingers gently massage the base of her skull while her other hand holds Dani firmly by the hip. It’s overwhelming, how right it feels. Standing in the middle of a crowded gay bar with Jamie on a Sunday evening, just holding her.

After a while Dani pulls back, rests her forehead against Jamie’s. “Is it wrong that I want to kiss you?”

She can feel Jamie’s shaky exhale against her lips. “I don’t know, is it?”

Dani gulps back the urge to cry all of a sudden. “I don’t think I can go back. If I kiss you, I don’t think I’ll be able to go back to just being a housewife.”

Jamie pulls away from her, looks at her seriously, her eyes dark with desire. “Then kiss me.”

Dani does.

Soft at first, searching. Searching for what she’s not sure but she knows when she finds it. She knows, when Jamie’s hand tangles in her curls and the other slides around to the small of her back to pull her closer, that whatever that thing is that she’s been searching for her whole life, it’s this.

She flicks her tongue against Jamie’s lip, bites back a moan when Jamie’s tongue meets hers. She pushes herself closer, as close as she can get. Clings desperately to Jamie’s open shirt. Lets the noise of the bar die around them as Jamie’s tongue carefully explores the inside of her mouth, along her teeth, her lips. Each time eliciting soft, joyous sounds that Dani doesn’t have the good sense to feel embarrassed about.

She kisses Jamie like her life depends on it. Thinks maybe that her life does depend on it - this new part of her life, this part of herself that she’s tried for so long to ignore, to push down, finally seeing the light of day and fighting desperately to stay in the sun.

She kisses Jamie long after her lungs start to burn for her to take a full breath. When she does pull back, takes in a gulp of air, it feels like the first clear breath after so long spent drowning.

“You alright?” Jamie’s breath tickles across her upper lip.

She searches Jamie’s face, a hair's breadth from her own. Searches it for any reason as to why she shouldn’t feel alright now. She knows there is one, sitting at home waiting on her, but she can’t see that in Jamie’s eyes. In Jamie’s cautious smile.

She can’t see that part of her life when Jamie’s standing so close.

“I really liked the autograph you gave me,” she admits eventually - instead of admitting all the other stuff she’s thinking.

Jamie chuckles. “Yeah, kinda figured.”

Dani smiles. “I also think this is the most alright I’ve ever been in my entire life.”

She leans in again, kisses Jamie soundly, carefully. Tries to show Jamie just how alright she is with nothing more than the gentle press of her lips.

She pulls back and leans her forehead against Jamie’s. She takes a hand and places it against Jamie’s sternum, smiles to herself when she feels Jamie’s heart against her open palm.

“I just don’t know what to do next.” It’s not entirely true - she knows what she should do - but it’s a lot easier to admit than saying that she’s just too scared to do it.

“One day at a time Poppins,” Jamie promises her, voice barely above a whisper. “We take this one day at a time.”

Dani nods. “One day at a time,” she echoes, leaning back to smile at Jamie.

“S’all we’ve got really, when you get down to it.”

Dani laughs, kisses the tip of Jamie’s nose just for the hell of it. Just because here, in this dingy little gay bar, she can kiss Jamie as much as she likes. She laughs even harder when Jamie’s nose scrunches, when her laughter is echoed in Jamie.

“Will I see you on Friday?” Jamie asks, a delicate string of hope in her question.

Dani leans in, kisses Jamie like she was born to do it. Parts her lips with her tongue and doesn’t stop kissing her until a low moan rumbles up from Jamie’s chest and out against Dani’s parted lips.

“Friday.” She promises against her lips. “I can’t wait.”

\----

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday all pass in a blur.

A blur of school children and home cooked meals. A blur of Jeopardy and Family Feud and The Price is Right. A blur of phone calls with her mother and quiet breakfasts with Eddie. A blur of suburban housewives and endless chores.

And it should be easy.

It should be easy for Dani to get washed away in the blur of the week, just like she’s always done.

It should be easy for her to step back into the role of Danielle O’Mara. A roll she’s been playing so well all this time. A roll that always fit her like a slightly chunky suit of armor, but fit her nonetheless.

This week though she can’t help but feel as if she’s the only person that’s not seen the script. The stage lights have come up and she’s standing there, looking out at her suburban life, and she doesn’t have a single clue what’s going on.

In fact she feels now as if she’s been handed a different script entirely. Not the story of a confused girl meeting a confused boy and helping said boy figure himself out while she remains confused. 

No this story feels a lot more like the story of a woman. A woman finally allowing herself the space to figure herself out. Finally finding people that are willing to hold her hand while she does so, without pushing their own edits into her notes.

This story is one written out in messy cursive on the back of a hospital pamphlet, tucked neatly in her bedside locker.

This is her story, and Jamie’s now too.

An off script sort of story, but theirs nonetheless. 

This is their story, and all week as she tries to allow the days to wash her away in their blur the one thing anchoring her is the thought of Friday. The thought of a crowd of people laughing at her jokes and cheering her on. The thought of Jamie, cheering just a little louder than everyone else in the room.

\----

“I’ll be home later than usual this evening,” Eddie’s telling her, one arm already in his suit jacket.

“That’s alright,” Dani tells him with a gentle smile. “I’ve book club this evening anyway.”

Eddie sighs. “No you don’t Danielle.”

“Eddie I’m not having this argument again, I’m not going to--”

“Danielle, Danielle…” Eddie waves his hands to silence her, it just makes her want to scream at him more. “I’m not trying to stop you from being part of the club or whatever, I just mean we’ve that dinner with Mr. Wingrave this evening, remember?”

Dani feels like she’s just been sucker punched in the gut. She thinks maybe she’s going to burst into tears. Feels the lump rising in her throat and the sting behind her eyes.

“You’ve not forgotten, have you?” Eddie’s frustrated now, it just makes Dani want to cry more. “I mean this could be a really important dinner Danielle. This could secure me that promotion. And I mean I told you about--”

“I’ve not- not forgotten,” she clears her throat roughly, “Just uh- just got my days mixed up is all.”

She looks up at him then and wants so badly to tell him. Wants to break down on her hands and knees sobbing and explain to him that she can’t do it. That she can’t do the dinner and she can’t be his wife and she can’t love him like he deserves to be loved.

He’s smiling at her now though, his lips twisting into an apology for getting frustrated with her. Sort of like the smile he had when they were teenagers and he’d lament his frustrations over their calculus homework then smile that sorry little smile when he realised he’d been taking out his frustration over calculus on her.

How the hell was she supposed to break this man's heart?

“I said I’d make a roast, didn’t I?” She asks, clapping her hands together to break through the tension. “That still okay with you?”

Eddie leans over and presses a kiss into her cheek. “Sounds perfect honey, thank you.”

Dani smiles to hide the slight flinch when he’d leaned in to kiss her. “What time did you say you’d be home at again?”

“Eight,” Eddie offers vaguely. “Well maybe closer to half eight to be honest, Mr. Wingrave wants us to finish a case we’re dealing with before coming home.”

“I’ll have dinner ready for eight then.”

\----

At half eleven she convinces herself she should go to the gig anyway.

At two o’clock she talks herself out of it again, starts flicking through recipe books to find some exciting new way to cook carrots and parsnips.

At five past four she shoves her jacket on roughly.  _ Both  _ she decides as she pushes open the front door, she can do both.

\----

She’s desperately late by the time she skids into the dressing room. She glances around, no sign of Jamie, though Hannah and Owen are both there with their same friendly smiles.

“Thought you weren’t coming?” Hannah eyes her curiously, then jumps up from the couch to help fix her shirt collar. “Miss the train?”

“Something like that,” Dani pants, trying to re-regulate her breathing. “When am I on?”

Owen leans over the railing and glances down at the stage. “Oh… thirty seconds, give or take?”

“Thirty- what?”

“Here, here,” Hannah fusses, taking Dani’s bag from her and helping her with her jacket. “Give it all here, you’ll be excellent dear.”

“Some of my best gigs are ones I was running late for,” Owen encourages as Hannah gently guides Dani to the stairs down to the stage.

Dani glances around once more, though Jamie still isn’t there. She takes a breath, looks down at the stage just as the act before her performs his last joke.

“Okay,” she breathes, more to herself than to her friends. “I’ve got this. Lets go.”

\----

It’s a lot of the same material as the night in the gay bar, with one or two tweaks here and there to account for a more conservative audience. It goes down just as well as it had done that night though, and Dani re-emerges at the top of the stairs smiling so hard it hurts.

“Holy shit Dani that was incredible!” Owen’s first to jump up to congratulate her. “To Dani,” he cheers, raising the beer in his hand into a toast and throwing his other arm around her shoulder.

“To Dani,” Hannah echoes, raising her own beer with a smile and a small nod.

“To Dani Fuckin’ Clayton. A star is born.”

Dani turns at the voice and there’s Jamie, leaning against the door frame, a beer in her hand and that same twinkle in her eyes that always seems to be present when she’s looking at Dani.

“I thought you weren’t here?” Dani asks, a little breathless as she gently removes herself from Owens embrace and takes a tentative step forward. “I mean I didn’t see you when--”

“I was up here for a bit,” Jamie explains, watching with hungry eyes as Dani comes to a stop just short of a distance that would allow her to reach out and pull her closer. “But I kinda decided I’d rather see you perform tonight from the good seats, y’know? Get you in all your glory.”

“And?”

Jamie huffs out a small laugh. “And I just think there might be something special about you Poppins.” She reaches out then, takes Dani’s hand in one of her own. “You able to stick around for a bit?”

“I wish I could but Eddie’s boss is coming over for dinner and I, well…” She trails off before the bile in her throat chokes her.

It feels so dirty, stretching herself thin like this. Balancing two completely different lives, knowingly hurting two people at once and for what? For five minutes holding Jamie’s hand before she has to high tail it across the city and back to her suburbian prison?

Jamie brushes her thumb over Dani’s knuckles, shakes her head a little. “You don’t need to feel bad,” she whispers so only Dani can hear - although Owen and Hannah have already had the good sense to pretend they’re busy with something on the other side of the room.

“I do though,” Dani admits, blinking furiously to hold back her tears. “What kind of a person runs off across town to- to--”

“See their mistress?” Jamie offers teasingly.

“That’s not--” The breath catches in Dani’s lungs. “That’s not what you are Jamie.” A single tear now, forging a fearless path for more to follow. “You’re so much more, I just--”

“Hey, hey…” Jamie pulls her into a hug, strokes her hand up and down Dani’s back while the other rests in her hair. “I’m sorry. I thought it was funny but it was a shitty thing to say.”

“You’re not the one that should be saying sorry,” Dani mumbles against her shoulder. “I’m the one doing this, I’m the one fucking it all up.”

“Hey now,” Jamie pushes her back gently, grips her shoulders. “You’re not fucking anyhting up Dani. I promise you.” She lifts her finger, wipes away some of Dani’s tears and rests her palm against Dani’s cheek. “You’re figuring this out. One day at a time, remember? We’re figuring this out one day at a time, and today just happens to be a day where you’ve to go home and cook dinner.”

Dani nods, lets out a watery laugh. “I’m still sorry though.” She sniffles. “I still am really fucking sorry.”

“I know, I know.” Jamie pulls her close again. “C’mere, we gotta get you cleaned up.”

She’s leading her away then, towards the bathroom at the back of the dressing room. The one no one ever uses because the sink is clogged and the toilet doesn’t flush properly. She sits Dani down on the lid of the toilet then clicks the door locked behind them.

She hunkers down next to her, wipes away some more of her tears.

“I don’t deserve you,” Dani sighs into some tissue she’s pulled from the dispenser. 

Jamie leans in, presses a kiss into her cheek. “I could say the same thing.”

Dani huffs out a laugh. “I’m a mess,” she motions down at herself, “not exactly a prize, now am I?”

Jamie shakes her head, presses a kiss into her other cheek. “You’re beautiful, and smart and funny.” She kisses her again on the forehead. “And you’re a really good person. You care so much about people you’re beating yourself up over your own happiness.”

“I don’t--” Dani falters.

“Poppins, I wouldn’t stick around if I didn’t think you were a good person. If I didn’t think that you wanted this. That you want us. I wouldn’t be able to stick around,” Jamie explains softly. “I know this is hard for you, I can’t imagine how hard it is for you to walk away from your life like that. It takes so much bravery Dani, it takes so damn much to do that but I’m not going anywhere. No matter how long it takes for you to find that bravery, or to find that right moment, I’m staying right here. It’s you, it’s me, it’s us Poppins, and so I’ll be here no matter what you need or when you need it I’ll be here until you’re ready to be brave.”

Dani sniffles, reaches out and grabs one of Jamie’s hands in her own. She looks down at it and twines their fingers together. Pulls it up and presses a kiss into Jamie’s knuckles.

“I’ve never wanted anything as much in my entire life as I want you,” she admits into the calluses of Jamie’s fingers. “I’ve never craved something as much as I crave time in your presence.”

She kisses the tips of each of Jamie’s fingers. Looks up at Jamie as she does it, watches Jamie watching her - her expression darkening with each gentle brush of her lips. She reaches Jamie’s pinky then works her way back up to her middle finger.

She kisses it slower now, licks her tongue around it. Pushes it past her parted lips to the first knuckle, then pulls it back out slowly. Watches Jamie the whole time as her eyelids grow hooded and her lips part just slightly.

“I’ve never wanted anything as much as I want you, Jay,” she whispers.

“How much?” Jamie croaks, her voice an octave lower than it had been. “How much do you want me?”

Dani doesn’t think.

She drags Jamie’s hand down the length of her body, across her chest, her stomach. With her free hand she rucks up her skirt. Then, without ever breaking eye contact, she pushes Jamie’s hand between her legs.

Lets Jamie feel how wet she is, even through her underwear.

“So much Jay,” she tells her with a shudder, as two caloused fingertips run down the length of her heat. “I want you so much.”

Then Jamie’s lips are crashing into hers and it’s nothing like their first kiss. Whereas that had been all about exploration, about finding their feet, this one was all desperation. It was hungry, and frantic and when Dani gasps and Jamie takes the opportunity to shove her tongue into Dani’s mouth she forgets all sense of anything outside this room.

And when Jamie strokes once more roughly over her underwear and her hips buckle into the touch she forgets that anything exists outside of Jamie. Outside of Jamie’s mouth and Jamie’s hands.

Jamie, Jamie, Jamie.

“Jamie…” She whines, as a hot trail of kisses are planted against the column of her neck. “Please…”

Her hips buckle again to emphasise her point.

Jamie doesn’t need to be told twice. She pushes Dani’s underwear aside and two of her fingers start drawing slow but firm circles against her clit.

“This okay?” She husks, her breath warm and heavy against the side of Dani’s face.

Dani turns her head and captures Jamie’s lips in a sloppy kiss. Whispers desperate affirmations against her mouth as she grinds her hips down into Jamie’s touch.

Then Jamie runs her fingers down the length of Dani, gathering wetness, testing her by dipping a single finger inside her to the first knuckle and Dani’s entire body shudders.

“Please baby,” Dani whispers, her head falling forward against Jamie’s. “Please… fuck me.”

Jamie growls and Dani can feel it against her lips.”Move forward,” she demands, and so Dani obliges, scooting herself until she’s balancing on the edge of the toilet seat, depending more on Jamie’s body bracketed in front of her to keep her in place than her own shaking legs.

Jamie looks at her softly, strokes a hand across her cheek, lets it wander around to the back of her head so she can pull Dani forward for a kiss. It’s hot, and soft and distracts Dani right up until the point where two of Jamie’s fingers are being pushed into her slowly.

She gasps against Jamie’s lips and then Jamie’s tongue is there to lap up the sounds. The gentle mews of pleasure as her fingers find their rhythm. The low groans as Dani’s hips match that rhythm, chasing each sharp thrust of Jamie’s hand, shuddering into each careful curl of her fingers inside her.

“Jay…” Dani whines against her lips, her hands pawing desperately at the back of Jamie’s top to find purchase. “Faster baby... I--”

Immediately Jamie picks up the pace. Immediately Dani’s eyes roll back in her head at the sensation.

She’s never felt anything like this before. With Eddie, well with Eddie it had always been something of a chore. Just another chore on her list, every Saturday evening - sometimes on a week night if he was feeling particularly risque - she’d get herself comfy on their large double mattress and smile up at him sweetly as he hovered above her looking like he was about to rock her world.

She supposed that’s maybe the first place she’d become adept at lying to him. Probably why it felt like second nature now.

No, this was nothing like Eddie, and nothing like what she was able to do to herself either, on the rare occasion she had the house to herself for an afternoon and she reclined carefully against her headboard, hand positioned eagerly yet tentatively between her legs.

This is Jamie, with her twinkling eyes and her easy smile and her jaw that could cut glass. This is Jamie, one of Dani’s hands knotted in her dark curls, the other clinging desperately around her back as she pushes herself in further against her fingers in obscene and rhythmless thrusts now.

This is Jamie, breathless with her own desire and from the blistering pace she was maintaining as she fucked Dani sensless righ there in that dingy little bathroom. This is Jamie, whispering affirmations against Dani’s lips as Dani rushes towards the edge, as her body shudders and her hips buckle frantically towards--

“I’m gonna- I’m gonna- Jay please…” She gasps around a moan.

Jamie pushes her thumb hard against Dani’s clit, rotates it in a way that matches the motion of her fingers still pumping inside her.

“Cum for me Dani,” Jamie demands against her lips. “Cum for me baby.”

So Dani does. Dani does because right now it’s the only thing Jamie wants that Dani can fully commit to. Right here in this moment, as Dani’s body convulses and tightens around Jamie’s fingers Dani knows she can give herself fully to Jamie.

Here in this dingy little bathroom upstairs in a comedy club Dani can offer all of herself to Jamie, even if it’s just for a few moments.

\----

“Shit…” Dani whimpers, when Jamie eventually retracts her fingers.

“You okay Poppins?” Jamie whispers, wiping her hand on a piece of tissue from the dispenser then bringing it up to cup Dani’s cheek. “Was that…?” She trails off awkwardly, Dani shakes her head.

“That was…” She pushes out a relieved breath. “I mean yea, that was…” She shakes her head again, breaks off into a peal of laughter.

“What?” Jamie asks, trying her best not to laugh herself at Dani’s sudden hysterics.

Dani shrugs, sighs out another laugh. “I mean…” Dani motions around them. “I just can’t believe we just did that here.”

Jamie examines the room around her, nods once. “I mean yeah, not how I imagined it happening.”

Dani looks Jamie dead in the eye, bites her lip. “You’ve thought about it before then?”

Jamie’s eyes instantly darken. “Haven’t you?”

Dani nods, one of her hands weaving around Jamie’s neck, the other starting work on the buttons of her shirt. “Every day since the day I met you.”

“And does this…” Jamie’s hands pull at her waist. “Live up?”

Dani hums eagerly as she leans in to Jamie’s lips. “Exceeds expectations.”

Then Dani’s kissing Jamie slowly, exploring with her tongue as her hands make quick work of her shirt. She grazes her fingers across Jamie’s abdomen, torn between breaking the kiss to lean back and look, and letting her hands do the looking for her.

She traces across her ribs, up over her chest, cupping her breast gently in her hand, running a careful thumb over her bra until Jamie arches into her touch. 

She smiles into the kiss. Is just about to pull the fabric aside when--

“Oh my god!” She starts suddenly, jerking back from Jamie’s embrace. “The dinner.”

“The what? The-” It takes Jamie’s sex clouded mind a second to kick back into gear. “Oh fuck.”

“Oh shit.” Dani just sits there, frozen in horror. “What the hell am I gonna do?”

Jamie’s already jumped into action though, already standing and rebuttoning her shirt when she taps Dani’s shin gently with her foot. “Up, c’mon, up,” she encourages with a smile. “What time’s dinner?”

“Eight,” Dani tells her mournfully. “He said they’d be home for eight.”

“Okay well it’s six thirty now,” Jamie tells her, glancing down at her watch. “Anything in particular you said you’d cook?”

Dani worries her lip between her teeth. “A roast.”

“Hm, okay well… I might not be able to help with that, but we’ll see how it goes.” Jamie grabs Dani’s hands, pulls her up from the toilet, then rearranges her skirt.

“Wait, what?”

“Well like Owen said, I’m not much of a cook, but I can set a table and uh…” Jamie falters. “Actually yeah, I can set a table.”

“You’re coming to dinner with me?” Dani’s brain trips over itself to try and make sense of the situation unfolding.

“Well uh, no, I’m not gonna sit through a stuffy dinner with your husband and his boss Poppins,” Jamie shoots her a look as if she’s gone mad. “I am gonna help you make it though.”

“Why?” Dani breathes. “Why do you wanna help me stay in Eddie’s good books?”

Jamie furrows her brow. “I told you already. It’s you, it’s me, it’s us.” She smiles, motions between them. “Whatever this weird situation is we figure it out together. All of it. Even if that means me preparing dinner for your husband.”

“It’s you, it’s me, it’s us,” Dani repeats almost desperately, almost like a lifeline.

“Plus it’s either come round to yours and cook dinner, or sit in this bathroom and think about the orgasm I just missed out on,” Jamie teases.

“Oh god,” Dani covers her head in her hands. “I’m so sorry, I promise I’ll make it up to you.”

Jamie presses a kiss into her hairline. “I’m only messing,” she assures her. “Well… I mean I was looking forward to it, but I’m also more than capable of finishing the job myself if need be.”

Dani groans. “Don’t say that,” she warns. 

“Oh?” Jamie pushes, a small smile on her lips.

Dani looks up at her. “The thought of you finishing yourself off like that?” Dani sighs, places a hand on Jamie’s chest. “Makes me want to bend you over the sink and…”

Jamie’s whole face flushes. Dani thinks it’s the first time she’s seen the brunette get flustered since they first met. It thrills her a little.

“Okay…” Jamie clears her throat roughly, takes a deliberate step away from Dani. “Think it’s about time we got ourselves a taxi. Otherwise I’m not sure you’ll make it to dinner at all.”

Dani laughs. Jamie turns abruptly on her heel and unlocks the door.

\----

The taxi ride is uneventful. Save for Jamie’s hand running up the inside of Dani’s leg the entire way, the two of them bunched together in the back a lot closer than strictly necessary.

When they get back to the house Dani is overwhelmed with a sudden urge to mess the place up a little. To unplump some pillows, scatter a throw haphazardly across the arm of a chair, stack a few books clumsily on the coffee table in the livingroom. Anything to make this house look more like a space that is lived in and less like a showhouse.

Anything to make this space look like something Jamie might fit in, and not a space so pristinely one she shares with Eddie. All rigour and rules. All straight edges and polished to perfection.

Jamie looks out of sorts here, she notes, as the brunette removes her jacket and hangs it on the hook in the hall next to Dani’s. Jamie is so not someone built to fit in this suburbian caricature. Not someone who fits into the easy comings and goings of pot-lucks and over the hedge gossip.

It makes Dani’s heart swell.

To know that this person, this person she so rapidly finds herself falling for, is so far removed from this world she feels trapped in. To see her, standing in the middle of her livingroom now, giving it a skeptical once over, and to know that this person she’s come to thedar so much of her happiness on could so easily whisk her away from this white picket fence prison.

A new world, beyond the neatly strimmed gardens and the friendly smiles that hide teeth. That’s the world Jamie can offer her and Dani can see it so clearly now, as Jamie clears her throat to speak.

“S’clean,” she notes, her eyes finally finding their way back to Dani.

Dani nods. “Always.”

“You don’t strike me as a neat freak,” Jamie comments without malice, steps closer to Dani as she speaks and peers over her shoulder into the kitchen. “That the scene of the soon to be crime?”

Dani turns to look into the kitchen. “If you’re still up for the challenge.”

Jamie looks at her, smiles. “Lead the way.”

So Dani does. She grabs Jamie’s hand and leads her across the threshold into the kitchen - another pristine room with polished marble effect counters and a table in the centre that looks like it’s never been used.

“I’m not by the way,” Dani comments vaguely, as she bends down to one of the lower cupboards and begins pulling out pots. “A neat freak,” she clarifies once she’s standing again.

“Thank god,” Jamie tells her with a small laugh. “You would  _ not  _ like my place if you were.”

Dani places some of the pots and pans down on the stove top, takes one to the sink with her to fill with water. “You inviting me over?”

Jamie comes up behind her as she fills the pot, wraps her arms around Dani’s waist and wriggles her head into the crook of her neck. “That depends. You wanna come over?”

Dani smiles, leans back into Jamie’s embrace. “I suppose you could convince me.”

Jamie presses a kiss into her cheek then moves back. “That pot’s going to overflow.”

Dani lets out a surprised little squeak and pulls it away from the tap. Water sloshes down the side of the counter. 

“Shit…” She hums, glances up at the clock. “Shit,” she repeats, 7:15 glaring back at her, mocking her.

“Don’t panic,” Jamie, calm as ever, assures her. “I’ve got this, you get the potatoes on.” She shoos Dani from the counter back over to the stove.

She makes quick work of locating a tea towel and begins wiping down the counter while Dani puts the water on to boil and fishes some potatoes out of a nearby drawer to peel and half.

“Thank you,” she glances over her shoulder once Jamie’s taken care of the mess.

“What I’m here for,” Jamie reassures her with a smile. “You got a laundry bin somewhere I can throw this?”

“In the utility room, out there.” Dani motions with a tilt of her head and Jamie obliges.

By the time she’s back Dani’s sliding the potatoes into the water and covering them with a lid.

“One job down then,” Jamie nods approvingly. “Now, about this roast.”

Dani huffs out a laugh. “We do  _ not  _ have time to make a roast before eight o’clock.”

“Okay, so…” 

Dani turns to her. “You ever seared a steak?”

Jamie puffs out her chest, a look in her eyes like she’s just been told to go to the front line. “For you Poppins, I’ll give it a go.”

\----

Give it a go she does, and not fifteen minutes later Dani steps in and shoos her to the kitchen table. “Set it,” she orders. “I mean Eddie’s a steak well done kinda guy but this…” she prods at the charred piece of meat. “Is cremated.”

Jamie hovers next to her, smiling. “Steak well done, eh? Why is it you’re still with him?”

Dani turns to her, smiles a little. “Don’t open that can of worms.” She points to one of the drawers next to her. “Cutlery’s in there.”

Jamie moves to the drawer wordlessly, pulls out some forks and knives. “What if I do want to open that can of worms,” she asks casually as she steps over to the table.

“Jamie…” Dani warns.

Jamie just shakes her head. “No judgement.” She looks up at Dani. “You know I’d never judge you. I am curious though,” she pushes, without really sounding like she’s pushing at all. “I want to know everything about you Dani, and that includes how a person like you ended up… well--”

“Playing housewife?” Dani offers.

Jamie shrugs, starts putting down some forks. “You don’t seem like a housewife. You don’t seem like this is a life built for you.”

Dani lowers the heat in the pan next to her, turns to face Jamie fully. “We moved here when I was eight. We moved here from back-ass-of-nowhere Iowa after my dad died. I met Eddie on the first day of school, he lived two houses down and,” she shrugs. “And him and his family felt more like a real family than my mom-- well my mom drank a lot after dad died you see, so yea, whatever. Eddie became my family.”

Dani looks down at the floor, ashamed of this next part.

“And when you’re a little kid you’ll do anything to feel that. To feel like you have a family. So I did. I ate at his house most nights for dinner and I slept over every weekend, but before I knew it we weren’t little kids anymore. And suddenly being someone's best friend isn’t enough of a reason to be part of their family. Suddenly the little boy I loved was a teenager who loved me in a way I didn’t understand. All I knew was that in order to have a family I needed to love him back, to pretend that I loved him in that same way.”

She looks up at Jamie. Jamie, who’s looking at her with sad eyes and an even sadder smile.

Dani sighs. “I’ve lied to him my entire life Jamie. Since the first day he brought me flowers when we were thirteen years old and I accepted them because I was afraid of what would happen if I didn’t. I’ve lied to him every single day and I just…” her shoulders drop. “I don’t know how to stop that.” She laughs bitterly. “It’s become second nature to lie to him. So much so I don’t even know how to begin telling him the truth.”

There’s a long beat of silence then, and Dani wants to ask, wants to know if she’s scared Jamie off. If the idea that Dani’s stuck herself in this situation for all this time because she simply can’t figure out how to tell the truth is something that’ll scare her away.

She’s not brave enough to ask though, not with so much depending on the answer. Instead she waits until Jamie finally clears her throat.

“I was eight as well, when my folks upped and left. Well, mum left when I was six, ran off with some guy that worked in the bookies. Dad stuck around for a bit but god love him I’d have been as well doing it myself,” Jamie huffs out a laugh. “So yeah, I was eight when the foster system ate me up. Shoved me from pillar to post, from one pervy husband and cruel wife to the next.”

“I’m sorry…” Dani whispers, unsure of what else to say.

Jamie just shakes her head. “What I’m saying is that I get it Poppins. I know  _ exactly  _ what it feels like to crave a family. To crave stability. To crave love and acceptance and a home.” Jamie puts the knives down on the table and steps towards her. “I get it.”

She runs her hands up Dani’s arms, pulls her into her chest and kisses her forehead. Dani sighs out against her chest then takes a deep breath in. She smells like grass and smoke, and vaguely like charred meat.

“You feel like home,” she whispers after a moment. 

“Oh yeah?” Jamie pulls back to look her in the eye, a cheeky smile stretching across her face.

Dani nods, looks around her kitchen. “So much more than this place ever could,” she confirms. “So much more than any place ever could. I feel at home when I’m with you.”

Jamie ducks her head, presses a soft kiss into the corner of her mouth. “Same,” she breathes out against her lips. “I feel the same.”

“God I want to kiss you so badly,” Dani sighs, laughs a little at how frequently this previously dormant desire for physical affection flares up now.

“What’s stopping you?” Jamie teases, though she steps back anyway, back to her job setting the table.

“Eh, as much and all as I still haven’t figured out how I’m going to tell him exactly, I really don’t think that would be the best way for Eddie to find out?” She offers, turning back to her steaks.

“What, my hand up your skirt?” Jamie teases.

“I was thinking more you laid back naked on the kitchen table with my head between your legs, but sure,” Dani hums pleasantly, delighted at the strangled little sound Jamie makes behind her.

“You really are gonna be the death of me Poppins.”

\----

It’s a miracle really, as the clock strikes eight and Dani puts the final dish down on the table, she really must admit it feels like a miracle.

“I can’t believe we did that…” She hums, more to herself than to Jamie, though Jamie nods anyway.

“Owen’s gonna be so proud of my culinary prowess.” She comes up to stand next to Dani and examine their handiwork.

Dani snorts. “You burned a steak and set the table.”

“Oi, I did more than that!” She swats at Dani’s arm.

Dani smiles, turns towards her and places a hand on her abdomen. “You did,” she agrees. “You came with me.”

Jamie’s eyes crinkle with a smile as she turns around to Dani. “You know I’d--”

She’s cut off by the sound of the front door slamming. The sound of Eddie’s jovial  _ smells good in here  _ echoing around the house.

Something shatters inside Dani. She hadn’t thought ahead to this part - the part where Jamie wouldn’t have a chance to leave before Eddie came home. The part where they may actually have to face one another.

“Uh oh,” Jamie whispers, taking an unconscious step away from Dani. “You want me to sneak out the back?”

_ Sneak out  _ like some dirty little secret Dani should distance herself from in the clear light of day.

“I don’t want to have to hide you,” Dani admits quietly, conscious that Eddie and Mr. Wingrave are still chatting in the hall for now, but that they could come into the room at any minute.

“You sure?” Jamie quirks her brow.

Dani reaches out, grabs Jamie’s hand and squeezes it once then drops it. “I’m sure.”

“Okay,” Jamie puffs out her chest. “Lets go see what I’m up against then.”

She winks, and Dani smiles. Then they both turn and Dani leads them out into the livingroom.

“Well hey there,” Eddie greets once Dani rounds the corner. “I was starting to worry you weren’t-- oh,” he falters slightly when he spots Jamie. “Hi there?” 

“Hi,” Jamie greets easily, extending her hand for a quick shake. “Nice to meet you.”

Eddie drops her hand awkwardly, turns to Dani. “Danielle, this is Henry Wingrave.” He turns to the man next to him and Dani snaps her attention away from the awkward handshake she’d just witnessed.

“It’s a pleasure Mr. Wingrave,” she smiles warmly, accepts his hand when he extends it.

“Likewise,” Henry clips, though his smile seems genuine so Dani gives him a pass. “Though call me Henry, please.”

“Henry,” Dani corrects with a small nod. “And this is Jamie.” She turns to Jamie with a flourish, her smile a little too hard around the edges.

Henry, unlike Eddie, seems to take genuine interest and extends his hand with the same tight but kind smile. “Lovely to meet you. Are you staying for dinner as well?”

“Yea,” Eddie adds, his question directed at Dani. “Is she?” He seems annoyed, Dani just smiles through it.

“Jamie just came to offer some culinary support,” she explains easily - maybe the closest thing to the truth she’s told Eddie about Jamie so far.

“Yeah, yeah,” Jamie steps in, her smile tense but perfectly charming nonetheless. “I’m a whiz in the kitchen.” 

Dani coughs back a laugh.

“Oh,” Eddie’s eyes suddenly light up with recognition. “I do know your name, your Danielle’s friend from uh- from--”

“College,” Dani supplies in a rush, before Jamie has a chance to step in. “My friend from college.”

Eddie nods. “Do you teach in the city?”

“Eh…” Jamie clears her throat. “Taking a bit of a sabbatical at the moment, seeing what else is out there,” she offers weakly.

Dani swoops in again before Eddie can prod too far. “Well like I said, Jamie was just on her way out. How about you take Mr. Win- Henry, how about you take Henry through to the kitchen and I’ll be there in a minute.”

Eddie nods, turns to Henry. “Follow me sir!”

Henry blanches a bit at the word sir, but smiles graciously nonetheless. “Smells delicious,” he tells Dani before he leaves. “Can’t wait.”

Then they’re gone, though it’s not until Dani can hear the chairs being pulled out from under the kitchen table as they take their seats that she dares turn back around to Jamie. She blows out a breath.

“Christ…”

“Understatement,” Jamie agrees, still seeming a little out of sorts. “He’s not what I imagined.”

“Oh yea?” Dani reaches for Jamie’s jacket on the hook next to hers.

“Yeah…” Jamie confirms, her voice dropping to a whisper then as she accepts her jacket. “Always imagined you with someone shorter. Brunette maybe. Killer sense of humor and an ass that just won’t quit.”

Dani rolls her eyes. “You’re impossible.” She reaches up then, flattens out the collar of Jamie’s jacket against her shoulders. “You sure you’re okay though?”

Jamie shrugs. “It was weird,” she admits.

“I’m sorry.”

Jamie shakes her head. “Don’t be.” She studies Dani for a moment then, seeming to make up her mind on something before speaking again. “Can I see you tomorrow?”

Dani nods instantly.

“Can I…” Jamie falters, glances through to the kitchen door to make sure no one’s eavesdropping. “Show you my place?”

Dani nods again. “I’d love that.”

Jamie smiles at her softly. “Six o’clock, at the train station?” Jamie confirms. “Enjoy dinner,” she adds then, a little louder now.

Dani leans up, presses a kiss into Jamie’s cheek. “Goodnight Jamie.”

Jamie smiles at her, a twinkle in her eyes. “Goodnight Poppins.”

\----

“So…” Jamie offers, as they wander lazily down the street away from the train station. “I’m your friend from college, huh?”

Dani grimaces. “So aside from all the obvious stuff I’m keeping from him, he’s also not aware that I uh- do stand-up.”

Jamie blows out a breath. “Anything you are truthful with him about?”

Dani shrugs. “He makes a good lasagna,” she offers. “I don’t lie about that.” 

“Ah good,” Jamie hums. “You don’t keep the big stuff from him then.”

Dani laughs, and Jamie laughs along with her.

“Is this weird?” Dani asks then, as Jamie leads her down yet another street she doesn’t recognise. 

“Our relationship, or the shirt you’re wearing?” Jamie teases.

Dani swats at her arm. “Don’t be rude.”

“I’m kidding…” Jamie looks around the empty street, then with a grin pushes Dani up against a wall. “I love the shirt,” she whispers against the shell of her ear, dragging her lips down across her jaw towards her lips. “Can’t wait to take it off you later.”

Dani surges to meet her lips, giggling into the kiss as Jamie makes a show of splaying her hands out across the thin fabric and tugging at it playfully. 

Eventually Jamie leans back, careful to keep Dani pinned between her body and the wall. They stand there, both a little breathless and a little caught up in one another's eyes. It’s only when they hear footsteps that they finally separate.

The woman passing them gives them a judgemental look, though Jamie just waits for her to pass before making a face at her back.

“Anyway…” Jamie falls back into step next to Dani as they continue down the street. “Is what weird?”

“I don’t know, is it weird that we talk about my marriage so openly?” Dani wonders, glancing at Jamie as she speaks.

“It’s part of your life,” Jamie reminds her. “Part of our relationship,” she adds after a pause.

Dani hums in agreement. “I suppose. I don’t know, it just feels strange though.”

“We don’t have to talk about him if you don’t want to,” Jamie offers. “Or any part of your little suburbian hellscape if you prefer.”

Dani shakes her head. “I’ve no one else to talk to about it. Plus I don’t think it’s that it makes me uncomfortable. Maybe that’s what makes it weird to me? That I feel like I can talk to you about anything.”

“You know that’s not weird, right?” Jamie offers with a nudge, and Dani looks up to see a strange little smile on her face.

“It is for me,” Dani confesses. “Having someone I can be me around. It’s weird. Good weird, but weird.”

“Think you need more friends Poppins,” Jamie teases, though Dani can tell she’s deflecting from the real weight of the statement.

Dani just smiles harder, reaches down and grabs Jamie’s hand. “You’re my best friend.”

She wants to say more. Add one more sentence to the end of that confession. Not today though. Not right now while things are so confusing.

Instead she just basks in the glow of Jamie’s smile and lets herself be led through the city.

\----

Jamie’s apartment is small, cluttered. Her coffee table is overrun with half read stacks of books and every other free space is overrun with plants. There’s art, or flower baskets, on every free inch of wall space and what sparse furnishings there are are mismatched and a little worn.

Jamie’s apartment is perfect.

“Oh wow,” Dani breathes, doing a single rotation in the centre of the livingroom to take in the open plan space. “Jamie this place is beautiful.”

Jamie shrugs, throws her keys in a cute little ceramic bowl by the door. “It’s home.”

“It’s lovely.” Dani turns to her, smiles. “It’s very you.”

Dani takes in the crate of records sitting next to the bookcase, a Blondie record on top, and remembers the evening Jamie walked her to her train and they sang Heart Of Glass. She glances over the posters on the wall, spots ones signed by comedy icons. Over to the weights in the corner of the room, feels a little burn in her stomach when she thinks back to how effortlessly Jamie had carried her to the hospital that day on her back. Smiles over at a very clean, very underused looking kitchen.

She glances back at Jamie.

“It’s so perfectly you.”

“Eh, are you here for me or my apartment Poppins?” Jamie teases, stepping across the room and standing next to her.

“Apartment, definitely,” Dani tells her. “You’re just a nice bonus I guess.”

“Suppose I can’t complain,” Jamie sighs, pulling Dani in for a hug. “Least you’re not with me for my cooking.”

Dani laughs against her chest, winds her hands slowly around to her back. “I’ve more self preservation than that.”

Jamie hums against her hair. “Now that’s saying something.”

Dani swats at her back. “You going to be mean to me all day?” She pulls away from Jamie’s chest, looks her in the eye. “Because I distinctly remember something being said about you wanting to see me out of this shirt?”

“Funny that,” Jamie muses. “I was just about to offer you a guided tour of my bedroom.”

“Well bloody ‘ell mate, lead the way!” Dani giggles, her absolute worst attempt at a British accent.

Jamie physically winces, pulls away from Dani’s embrace and grips at her shoulders. Looks at her seriously.

“Dani, love, that was absolutely brutal,” she tells her.

Dani just smirks. “Guess you’re gonna have to punish me then.”

\----

“Jay please,” Dani whines, her hips buckling restlessly against Jamie’s playful fingers.

“Thought you said you wanted to be punished?” Jamie drawls, laid out at Dani’s side, not touching her at all really, bar one hand ghosting lightly between her legs.

She drags it down slowly, pushes lightly against Dani’s entrance, then back up to her clit where she swirls two fingers, teasing.

Dani, covered in a thin sheen of sweat, pushes down desperately against the feather light touch. “I take it back, please Jay,” she whines, turns to look her in the eyes. “Please baby.”

“Please what?” Jamie hums casually, though there’s a hunger in her eyes.

It sends a jolt of fire through Dani’s stomach. To see someone look at her like that, to know that she’s able to make someone look at her like that. Eddie never looks at her like that. As much and all as he loves her, he’s never looked at her quite like that.

“Fuck me…” she grinds down again against retreating fingers. “Please fuck me.”

Jamie smirks, leans across the bed and kisses Dani soundly, lets her tongue trace across her upper lip before she slips it into her mouth. “Okay.”

Two fingers shove inside her roughly and Dani cries out desperately at the sudden change of pace. Jamie leans over her more fully, leverages herself until she’s almost entirely on top of Dani, her fingers pistoning inside her at a pace that arches Dani almost entirely off the bed.

“Oh god y-yea… just like… yea,” Dani cries, her entire body rocking down into Jamie’s hand, the base of her palm grinding off Dani’s clit each time she does.

Jamie’s lips are on her neck, biting and licking, careful not to leave a mark. Dani’s hands are on Jamie’s back, more careless with the marks she leaves as her blunt nails score hot red tracks on her shoulder blades.

“Oh god… I don’t know how-- how much longer… oh god…” Dani whines then, throws one hand back to brace herself against the headboard as she arches as far off the bed and as far into Jamie’s touch as she can possibly manage.

“Not yet,” Jamie growls against the shell of her ear. “You can do more baby, you can take more.”

“I’m not-- I don’t…” Dani pants, her brain tripping over what little is left of her vocabulary.

“You can take more,” Jamie repeats, propping herself up until she’s hovering inches from Dani’s face. “Trust me?”

Dani nods, not capable much else right now.

Jamie slides her fingers out, up to Dani’s clit. Rotates them in tight, hard circles and Dani knows she could come from this alone. Knows how close she is to the edge, knows how little it would take for her to let herself fall over that edge right now.

She doesn’t though.

Instead she forces herself to keep her eyes trained on Jamie. Forces herself to push back against the fire in the base of her stomach. Forces herself to push out a shallow breath from between gritted teeth.

“Good girl,” Jamie hums, her free hand stroking through Dani’s hair.

She re-positions herself, kneels at Dani’s side and braces one arm at the side of Dani’s head for leverage.

“Trust me?” She asks again, carefully studying Dani’s face.

“Always,” Dani just about manages, barely recognising the rough edge to her voice.

Jamie nods. “Tell me if this isn’t comfortable.”

Before Dani has a chance to ask her what she means she’s sliding her fingers back inside her, this time adding a third. Dani’s entire body shudders, her mind goes blank.

“Okay?” Jamie whispers, the fingers motionless inside her while Dani adjusts, though her thumb continues drawing rough circles against her clit.

Dani bites back a desperate cry. “Mhm…” She manages, every nerve in her body standing to attention. “Oh-okay,” she whines, one arm thrown haphazardly around Jamie’s neck to drag her down for a kiss. “Okay,” she repeats dumbly against her lips.

Jamie swallows her first cry of pleasure when she starts moving her fingers, fucking her slowly, letting Dani stretch and adjust around the fullness. She can’t swallow the second though, not when Dani throws her head back in a strangled cry of pleasure when Jamie curls her fingers inside her.

Her second hand goes back to the headboard once more, as she begins to fuck herself down against Jamie’s fingers, her pace building in time with Jamie’s until she’s thrusting desperately to meet her hand.

“I’m gonna… Jay…”

Jamie smiles against her lips. “Now you can cum.” She kisses across her jaw to her ear. “Cum for me Dani.”

Dani digs deep, thrusts herself down hard once, twice more against Jamie’s fingers and then in an overwhelming rush everything tenses and spasms at once. Her entire body shudders and warmth spirals through every inch of her and the entire room goes fuzzy. The whole time Jamie’s fingers keep fucking her. Letting her ride out her high for as long as possible until eventually her body slumps back down into the mattress.

She groans a little when Jamie slides her fingers out of her, though she’s quickly enveloped in a hug that makes up for it. Their legs twine together and Jamie’s arm is around her back, stroking a random pattern against her spine.

Jamie kisses her hairline once, twice, three times. Dani hums happily against the crook of her neck.

“Alright down there Poppins?” Jamie asks, and Dani can tell she’s smiling.

“You could say that,” Dani sighs.

Jamie laughs a little, kisses her again on the top of her head once, twice. On the third kiss she moves to reposition herself, to give herself an angle where she can kiss Dani in earnest, though when she moves down the bed Dani’s thigh brushes between her legs.

Dani gasps at the same moment Jamie shudders.

Dani rolls back from her just a little, just enough to weave her arm between their bodies. Just enough to graze her finger through Jamie’s folds. Jamie’s eyelids flutter, her lips part.

“Baby…” Dani groans, pulling her hand back so she can examine the slick wetness coating her fingers. “You’re so wet.”

Jamie chokes out a strangled little laugh. “You uh, you kinda have that effect on me, yeah.”

Dani smiles at her, takes the two fingers to her lips and swirls her tongue around them. She hums, feels the flame in her own stomach reignite as Jamie’s eyes blow out with desire.

“I wanna taste you…” she trails the same two fingers down Jamie’s sternum, across her abdomen, following them with her eyes. “... Properly.” She stops them at her groin and strokes teasingly through the hair there, she glances back up at Jamie. “Can I do that?”

“You sure?” Jamie’s barely able to keep the husk out of her tone as she eyes Dani for any signs of hesitation.

Dani just nods though, pushes Jamie back gently into the mattress with her free hand. “Sure,” she confirms, repositioning herself then until she’s straddling Jamie’s waist. “I’ve never done this before though, so let me know if I should, uh…” 

Jamie nods, grabs Dani’s hand, kisses her knuckles. “I can’t see there being any issues, but I’ll let you know if I think of any tricks.”

Dani grins, leans down and captures Jamie’s lips. Kisses her softly at first, calming her own nerves while she works Jamie up. She trails her free hand down Jamie’s chest, cups her breast and grazes her thumb against her nipple until Jamie gasps into her mouth.

She slides her tongue in easily, licking up Jamie’s mews of pleasure as she moves to rolling her nipple between her thumb and forefinger.

She moves on to her other breast at the same time she licks her lips away from Jamie’s mouth and over to her jaw. She runs them slowly up to her ear, licking up along the shell of her ear before biting down on her earlobe.

Jamie shudders, Dani giggles breathlessly against her.

“Fan of that, are we?” She hums, licking once more along the shell of her ear for good measure.

Jamie’s hips buckle involuntarily, sending a pleasant jolt through Dani when Jamie’s hip rubs between her thighs. “Evidently,” Jamie huffs.

Dani smiles then moves on. Down across Jamie’s neck, her collarbone - little bites here and there that she soothes with a lick or a kiss, hoping they’re still just as red in the morning.

She laves at Jamie’s breasts with her tongue just briefly. Wants to give them more attention, though Jamie is writhing desperately beneath her now, trying to rub her legs together to find some friction.

She makes quick work of the rest of her journey, stopping only briefly to trail a hot line of kisses up the inside of Jamie’s thigh before she’s lying down flat on her belly, pushing Jamie’s legs open fully.

“Oh fuck…” She hums quietly.

Jamie lifts her head off the pillow. “Hey, if you’re not-- oh--”

Her head thumps back as Dani runs her tongue up the length of Jamie’s folds. She hums again, then repeats the motion, stopping her tongue at Jamie’s clit this time to swirl it experimentally. Jamie buckles down against her mouth.

She scratches down the back of Jamie’s thighs. Tries a few more experimental swirls and flicks of her tongue until she finds a motions she thinks Jamie really likes. One that makes the brunette gasp around a broken curse and thrust down hard against her face.

An over and back motion that she keeps up long after her tongue begins to ache from the sensation.

Jamie’s hands are tangled so hard in her hair it almost hurts - almost. Dani doesn’t really have it in her to care though as Jamie’s thighs tighten around her head to the point where she almost misses Jamie’s desperate plea.

“More… Dani… use your fingers baby.”

So Dani does, without ever stilling the motions of her tongue she slides two fingers inside Jamie easily and begins to fuck her.

It doesn’t take long after that before Jamie tenses up around her and cums around Dani’s fingers, against her tongue. Dani stays where she is, licks and fucks her through it, until eventually Jamie’s hands in her hair are gently coaxing her back.

“Holy shit,” Dani breathes as she crawls back up from between Jamie’s legs, positions herself flush against Jamie’s side.

“Think that’s meant to be my line,” Jamie mumbles, her eyes still closed, her breathing still ragged.

“I just didn’t realise that uh--” Dani trials off, a little embarrassed as she curls herself in further to Jamie.

“Didn’t realise what?”

Dani shrugs. “Didn’t realise sex could be that fun. That  _ good. _ ” She pulls her head back a little to look at Jamie, her cheeks a little flushed. “I didn’t realise that it was possible to have sex and not want it to stop. To…” she trails her fingers over Jamie’s abdomen, “want to keep going.”

Jamie shakes her head and smiles, leans in and kisses Dani soundly. “You’re going to be the death of me,” she tells her, though she’s already pushing Dani onto her back.

\----

“We should eat,” Jamie muses, Dani’s head in her lap as she runs her fingers through her hair.

Dani groans. “That means getting up, doesn’t it?”

Jamie laughs. “I mean, I have no intention of poisoning you so we could just get take-out?”

Dani rolls her head to the side, kisses Jamie’s abdomen, licks across the taught muscles that ripple against her touch. “I know what I’d like to take-out.”

Jamie’s face scrunches. “You know we’re lying naked in bed together. Think we’re past the cheesy pick-up lines stage Poppins.”

“I’ve never been able to use a cheesy pick-up line on someone, give me this?” Dani pleads.

Jamie hums. “Lotta firsts for you this evening it seems.”

“First time giving a woman an orgasm, first time having multiple orgasms, first cheesy pick-up line,” Dani lists, counting each off on her fingers while Jamie laughs. “First time spending the night with someone I- well--” she falters a little. “- someone I want to spend the night with,” she settles on finally.

_ Still too messy,  _ she reminds herself, pushing her preferred end to that sentence to the back of her head for now.

“You’re staying the night?” Jamie asks, brushing over Dani’s uncertain end to the sentence as if it hadn’t been obvious what she wanted to say.

“Why, you got someone else coming over once I leave?” Dani asks, meaning it as a joke though maybe there’s a bit of something else there too.

A bit of something she hadn’t realised before. That Jamie had every right to have other girls over. Lord knows Dani went back to her husband every evening, what’s to stop Jamie finding relief during the hours and days Dani spent playing wife.

Jamie seems to see the brief panic in Dani’s eyes, the accidental stumbling into a whole realm of possibilities she’s not seen coming until now.

“There’s no one else,” she reasures her with a firm look. “There could never be anyone else now that I’ve met you.”

Dani smiles up at her. “Wish I could say the same thing,” she says - because thanking Jamie for doing something she herself wasn’t capable of right now seems so disingenuous. 

“Same,” Jamie says without really thinking. “Sorry…” she adds once she realises how it sounds.

Dani shakes her head. “No you’re not.”

“No,” Jamie agrees. “I’m not.”

Dani lifts her hand, strokes Jamie’s cheek carefully, traces across her cheekbone. “I’d like to stay the night though, if you’ll have me?”

“What about Eddie?”

“Thinks I’m at my mom’s for the night.”

Jamie glances down at her. “You can’t stand your mom?”

Dani laughs. “See your mistake is that you presume just because you listen to me, and know me, that the man I’m married to should also know the first thing about my life.”

“Well, thank god for him not knowing you.”

\----

“What’re you doing?” Dani gasps around a mouthful of burger.

Jamie looks up, a lone pickle dangling between her fingers. “Saving my tastebuds,” she offers.

“You monster,” Dani scolds, leaning across the bed. “Give that here.” She grabs the pickle from between Jamie’s fingers and opens her own burger bun, laying it down carefully on top. “You don’t waste a good pickle Jamie.”

She looks up, notices the way Jamie’s smiling at her, notices the way her eyes twinkle. “You’re adorable, you know that?”

Dani blushes. “You’re not so bad yourself.”

She takes Jamie in then for a moment. Sitting cross legged and naked on the bed, mirroring Dani’s own position. There’s a spread of chips and empty burger containers sitting between them on the mattress.

“So…” Dani asks then, clearing her throat and re-assembling her burger. “What’re we doing tomorrow?”

Jamie’s face breaks out into a smile. “Really?”

Dani nods. “Told him I’d probably be home late. In case, y’know, you wanted to…”

“I wanna do everything with you Poppins,” Jamie reassures her. “For tomorrow though, how about we just see where the day takes us? See if we can’t carve out our own fun?”

“I don’t think having fun with you should be too much of a challenge.”

\----

Sometime after the takeout containers are pushed to the bottom of the bed with promises of dealing with them tomorrow they fall back into the mattress.

Into one another's arms. All soft giggles against warm skin as they whisper to one another between kisses. As they both allow sleep to drag them slowly under, safely wrapped up in one another's arms.

Dani thinks it’s the best night's sleep she’s ever had.

\----

“Jay,” Dani calls. “Where do you keep your coffee filters?” She ducks her head into another cupboard, yelps a little when Jamie comes up behind her and grabs at her ass.

She stands and spins into Jamie’s embrace, Jamie’s oversized flannel shirt bunched up at her elbows as she wraps her arms around Jamie’s neck.

“What’s a coffee filter?” Jamie asks genuinely, her own narrow frame clad only in a short t-shirt and a pair of boy shorts Dani had already managed to pull off her twice this morning before they finally left the bedroom.

“Are you serious?”

Jamie shrugs. “I mean we have instant coffee in if that’s okay?”

Dani’s heart trips over itself and her cheeks flush.  _ We  _ \- Jamie had called them a  _ we.  _

“Oh-kay…” Dani’s eyes go a little wide. “Item one on today’s to do list, we buy some good coffee. Maybe even a coffee machine if you’re so inclined?” 

“Look at you,” Jamie smirks. “Here one night and you’re already re-arranging the kitchen.”

Dani scoffs. “I’m not going to live somewhere I can’t make myself a decent cup of coffee.”

Jamie’s eyes go wide. Dani instantly realises what she’s said.

“I mean I- I just kind of had this- this idea. Um, not that- not that I’m expecting or- or…” she runs a shaky hand through her hair. “I just mean once I- once I do leave Eddie, I kind of just had this silly idea in my head that-- but it’s stupid, it’s not- I’m not trying--”

“Dani, Dani…” Jamie grabs her forearms, steadies her a little. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Okay,” Jamie repeats with a shrug. “I mean, as long as you’ve no issues with the plants that is. I’m quite protective about my plants, and they were here first.”

Dani breathes out a little laugh. “I’ve no issue with the plants.” She pauses, considers it for a moment. “Though I probably shouldn’t be the one to water them. I once killed a cactus.”

“Noted,” Jamie says with a nod. “Now would the lady like some dirt and toilet water coffee to start her day?”

\----

It’s a long while before they’re dressed and out the door, though once they are they spend most of the afternoon wandering through shops. Dani thinks they’ve made good progress on kitting out Jamie’s kitchen, even if she does indulge Jamie in a few too many of her impulse buys.

Both of them think they’re owed a well deserved break when they finally wander down Bly High Street that evening. Owens cafe is right there, and without much conferring they both veer instinctually towards it.

Dani smiles a little at the homely smell that greets her when they push open the door.

Owen isn’t behind the counter today, instead he’s seated at one of the booths. Dani realises it’s Hannah that he’s with, the two of them leaning back and gossiping over two cups of coffee that’ve long since gone cold.

“Well hello there,” Owen greets with a wave and a smile as they step up to the booth. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”

“Don’t go thinking we were missing you or anything Sharma,” Jamie warns as she slides into the booth next to him. “We’re just hungry.”

“From a busy day shopping I see,” Hannah comments, scooching over a little to allow Dani to clamber in next to her through the sea of bags she was holding.

“Jamie very graciously agreed to carry nothing,” Dani shoots a pointed look at the brunette across the table.

Jamie just ignores her. “I got a coffee machine!” She offers instead, clearly chuffed with the one Dani had helped her pick out two shops ago.

“Oh how very grown up.” Hannah nods approvingly.

“We also got a mug holder in the shape of a naked lady,” Dani adds. “So I wouldn’t get too carried away on the whole grown up thing.”

“Hey!” Jamie shoots her an indigent look. “You said it was cute!”

Dani’s face softens into a smile in spite of herself. “It is,” she concedes. 

She lifts her leg under the table and nudges Jamie playfully. Jamie smiles, nudges her back.

“We also got a necklace holder in the shape of a naked lady,” Jamie adds then, thrilled with the theme of their impulse buys.

“You don’t wear necklaces?” Owen points, clearly confused.

Jamie has the good sense not to let his comment catch her out too much. “As if I’m getting dressed up, jewellery and all, for you,” she snarks.

Dani fiddles with the chain around her neck, shoots Hannah a small smile when she notices the older woman's curious stare. Mercifully, conversation moves on.

“Well you’re going to want to get dressed up tomorrow,” Owen tells them.

“Oh?” 

He nods eagerly. “Got a call from Viola at the bar earlier. She said they’re moving the open-mic night to tomorrow. Apparently some big shot TV execs are sniffing about town for new talent and heard it was the place to be. Apparently winner on the night gets a spot on the Johnny Carson show.”

“Holy shit.” Jamie’s jaw practically hits the floor. “No way? How don’t I know about this?”

Owen shrugs. “She actually said she was trying to get in touch with you but couldn’t get through?”

“Ah,” Jamie nods and Dani notices a slight blush rise across her cheeks. “My phone may or may not have been off the hook last night.”

She glances for the briefest second over to Dani who can feel a blush of her own rushing up her neck now. Dani clears her throat, tries not to smile.

“So what’s the deal with it?” She asks. “Can I watch or is it a closed event? Ticketed?”

“I do believe you’ll be too busy to watch dear,” Hannah tells her with a smile. 

“Oh?” Dani scrunches her brow.

“Well yea,” Owen scoffs. “You’re performing too.”

Dani shakes her head. “Viola didn’t call me.”

“Did too,” Owen counters. “You just didn’t answer.” He looks between her and Jamie. “I mean seriously what is it with you two and phones?”

“Well I wasn’t - I wasn’t home lastn--” She clears her throat, suddenly aware of how she’s implicating herself. “Guess I missed the phone ringing.”

Hannah makes a noise then, something suspiciously resembling a laugh, though she quickly masks it with a cough.

“So you’re both in then?” Owen asks, clearly missing the subtext of the whole conversation.

“Of-fucking-course!” Jamie practically shouts. “Right?” She turns to Dani, her expression softening slightly when she asks.

Dani smiles at her, nudges her again under the table. “Of-fucking-course,” she echoes softly.

Jamie’s smile breaks out into a full grin.

Owen shoots her a puzzled look. “Why’d you kick me when you said that?” Dani goes scarlet.

“Probably to get you on your feet to get us a round of drinks to celebrate,” Hannah offers quickly.

“Ah, an excellent suggestion.” He turns to Jamie. “Shift yourself so I can get out.”

“Are you supposed to be able to go behind the counter on your days off?” Jamie asks as she slides out from the booth. 

Owen shoots her a grin over his shoulder as he walks away. “Who said it was my day off?”

Jamie follows Owen over to the counter, adamant she pick her own beer -  _ none of that light shit you’re so keen on.  _ Dani watches her go, smiling softly at the giddy hop in her step.

When she turns back around Hannah’s studying her carefully.

“Be careful,” the older woman warns simply.

She’s not judging Dani though. There’s a protective quality in the way she says it, and something deeply kind and understanding in her eyes. It makes Dani want to hug her, want to cry, want to ask her for advice.

She does none of that though. Jamie and Owen are already making their way back, their arms full of beer to save themselves multiple trips to the fridge.

“Your favourite,” Jamie hums, sliding a beer across the table to her as she takes her seat again.

Dani glances up and smiles her thanks, notices the twinkle in Jamie’s eyes.

_ Far too late for careful now. _

\----

A sloppy kiss with Jamie and a promise of tomorrow carries Dani all the way from the train station to her own front door.

Well that, and maybe also the warm, tipsy humming in her head.

She kicks off her shoes with a happy sigh. Fiddles with the buttons and zip on her jacket a little longer than would normally be required, humming all the while. She’s humming Heart of Glass she realises, as she slips her jacket on the hook in the hall. She smiles to herself, turns on the spot and--

“You’re late.” 

Eddie, standing in the middle of the staircase in his pajamas. A look on his face somewhere between anger and panic.

“S’only,” Dani glances down at her watch, “half eleven.”

“You’ve been gone since six yesterday evening Danielle,” Eddie laments, taking the last few steps in his stride until he’s standing in front of her in the hall. “Where the hell were you?”

“My moms.” Dani staggers back a half step from the sudden proximity. “I told you I was at hers.”

“I called her earlier to see where you were. She said she hadn’t seen you,” Eddie counters, a sharp edge almost like a growl in his voice now. 

Dani’s blood runs to ice. She suddenly feels  _ incredibly  _ sober as Eddie looms over her, quietly seething with rage. She scrambles desperately for something, anything constructive to say to defuse the situation.

“Oh…” is all she manages.

“Oh?” Eddie throws his hands in the air. “Oh is all you have to say? You’ve been gone a day and a half with no way for me to get in touch with you and when you do come home you stink of beer and cigarettes and all you have to say is  _ oh _ ? Danielle what the fuck is going on here?” 

“Eddie I--”

“Is there someone else Danielle?” His voice is still seething, but with a crack in it now, a crack that breaks Dani’s heart.

Her breath hitches and her shoulders sag. She runs a hand through her hair as the sickening taste of bile raises in her throat. It was now or never.

She’d expected to have more time. She’d expected to do this on her own terms. To sit him down in their too-clean kitchen and hold his hand as she explained it all to him. Explain her childish desire for a family. Explain her love for him never quite living up to what she heard love could be. Explain to him a whirlwind romance that started with a simple utterance of  _ kill ‘em kid  _ and the twinkle of kind eyes. Explain to him how that romance had taught her to be brave, taught her to go off script. Explain to him that now was her time to try those things out in her life instead of just learning about them from others.

Explain to him how the two of them had ended up here, sitting in the too-clean kitchen of their too-clean house, holding hands while she broke his heart.

That was not this moment though and suddenly her mind reeled for the right way to say it, for the kindest way to break his heart while he stood in front of her, eyes brimming with tears the same way they had when she’d agreed to marry him, when she’d met him at the bottom of the aisle in a too-white dress. 

“Eddie I can explain,” she lies - there’s no explaining this, not really.

“Well by all fucking means Danielle,” he gestures dramatically. “Floor’s all yours.”

Dani takes a breath, decides to start at the beginning - where better to start after all.

“I’ve been restless,” she admits quietly, eyes darting down to the floor. “For months. Maybe years, I’m not sure, but I’ve just been so restless so…” she motions vaguely. “... something. Something I couldn’t understand, couldn’t put my finger on.”

She glances up at Eddie. His expression is steely, emotionless save the unshed tears still threatening to spill down his cheeks. She pushes on.

“I needed something. Something that wasn’t just suburbia and more importantly, something that was just mine. Something I didn’t have to share,”  _ with you  _ goes left unsaid.

“You’re making no sense,” he says, his voice gravelly and barely held together.

She blows out a breath, pushes on. “I found this- this comedy night. A place in town called Bly Manor Bar. A weekly comedy night, on a Friday and- well it’s actually on Monday this week but that’s not the point.” She’s rambling now, she clears her throat, tries again. “It’s what I’ve been doing instead of the book club I told you I was going to. It’s also where--”

“A comedy night?” Eddie cuts in, suddenly breathless.

Dani nods. “Yea, yea. A weekly thing, and see the thing is, while I was there, I met--”

She doesn’t finish her sentence though. Can’t finish it really, because all of a sudden Eddie’s dropped to his knees in front of her. His arms are wrapped around her legs and he’s sobbing into her stomach all of a sudden and Dani feels like she’s in some kind of nightmare.

She swallows the feeling of dread sitting in her chest and with a shaky hand strokes her fingers once through his hair.

“Eddie what the--”

“Jesus Danielle I thought you were cheating on me,” he sobs, his voice muffled in the warm fabric of her jumper - the warm fabric that suddenly felt suffocating. “I thought- thought you were going to leave me or-or--”

He breaks off into fresh sobs. Dani thinks she might get sick right then and there.

“Eddie please…” Dani tries to push him back a little, tries to give herself some room to breathe.

“I’m so sorry,” he whimpers, clinging to her even harder. “I’m so sorry you felt like you couldn’t share this with me. I want you to be able to share everything with me Danielle.” He leans back, looks up at her. “I love you so much Danielle and I want us to be together, forever. So we need to learn to communicate better. To share everything.”

Suddenly there’s a tightness in her chest. The sickly feeling in her stomach feels stronger than ever now and her vision’s starting to blur. She clutches at one of Eddie’s shoulders as her legs begin to shake, vaguely aware that she’s crying now too.

_ I love you so much Danielle. _

_ Together forever. _

_ Share everything. _

It’s a promise of the entrapment she’s feared all along. Like a beast in the jungle that’s finally caught up with her. It hits her far harder than the proposal, than the wedding. Those were the beast toying with her, his claws just sharp enough to break skin. This though, this felt like al shot at her jugular.

She doesn’t know why but she’s on the floor now. Eddie’s cradling her against his side and she wants to scream at him. Tell him she can’t breathe with him suffocating her like this. Tell him she might never breathe again if he keeps suffocating her like this.

She thinks back to something Hannah had said the first time they’d met. Something about being a ghost. Something about haunting a place until her voice and the memory of her fade.

Dani wonders distantly if that’s what’s destined to happen to her. Wonders if Jamie is merely the person destined to carry the memory of her while she rots in suburbia.

It feels like hours before her breathing returns to normal. Before the ringing in her ears fade out enough for her to hear Eddie saying something against the side of her face.

“What?” She murmurs dumbly, flinching away from his clammy breath on her cheek.

“I said I want to see you perform,” he repeats, completely oblivious that Dani’s reaction had been anything more than relief at his being okay with the situation.

“You- but you--”

“You said it’s on Monday this week?” He glances down at her, grin like a cheshire cat. “That’s tomorrow.”

Dani wonders if it’s possible to have two panic attacks in such quick succession. 

“But if I know you’re there I won’t be able to focus. I won’t be able to--”

Eddie waves her off. “You’re always saying you want me to take more of an interest Danielle. Plus, I’m excited! I’m excited to see what you got! I’ll tell Mr. Wingrave I’ve got a dentist’s appointment or something. Tell him I’ve got to leave early. We can meet here once you’re done school and head in together. What time is it at? Maybe we could get food first or…”

Dani drowns out the specifics of his ramblings. Instead lets them wash over her like crashing waves slowly eroding a coastline. Slowly wearing it down until there’s nothing left.

She closes her eyes and lets a single tear roll down her cheek.

_ Was happiness really supposed to be this hard. _

\----

“Nice looking place,” Eddie comments as they cross the street towards Bly Manor Bar the following evening. “Kinda thought it’d be dingier or something.”

Dani shoots him a look but says nothing, just slides up next to the bouncer. He smiles when he sees her.

“Dani, how’re we tonight?” He unhooks the red rope blocking off the door - a new feature for the bar, presumably something to do with the TV execs.

“Nervous,” Dani tells him truthfully.

He smiles, misinterpreting her reasoning and she steps past the rope. Lets him close it over without really thinking not to.

“Oh sorry,” Eddie interjects once he’s cut off from crossing the coveted red line. “I’m actually with her too, I’m her husband.”

The bouncer shoots Dani a quizzical glance. “That true?”

Dani’s smile stretches even thinner. She toys with the idea of saying no and running off. Toys with it, but doesn’t actually have the guts to go through with it - story of her life apparently.

“Yea,” she nods. “That’s him.”

The bouncer nods once, lifts the rope again. “You’re lucky,” he tells Eddie as he slides in past him. “Place is sold out tonight.”

“Holy shit.” Eddie turns wide eyed to Dani. “Sold out? How big is this thing.”

“Kinda a big night,” Dani tells him roughly, her anxiety pushing itself further and further up in her throat the closer they get to the main door.

“Also what was that about him calling you Dani?” Eddie laughs as Dani pushes in the main door. “Since when does anyone call you Dani?”

Dani isn’t listening though, not really. Her eyes dart frantically around the small area between the main doors to the bar and the stairs to the dressing room. Searching for any sign of Jamie waiting in the wings.

Her stomach churns, part of her wants to see her because part of her always wants to see Jamie. Part of her though, a bigger and smarter part of her, prays with every fiber of her being that the brunette is running late. Maybe even sick, though she hates herself for even entertaining that idea, she knows how big a night like this could be for her.

“How about you go into the bar, grab yourself a table, grab a drink,” she says all in a rush, barely looking at Eddie as she speaks. “I need to go upstairs. The dressing rooms are up-- Jamie.”

There she is, emerging from the bar, a beer in one hand at her joke notes in the other. She catches Dani’s eye and there’s that twinkle.

Dani’s heart shatters.

“Well hey there you, I was wondering whe-- Eddie?” Jamie glances between the two quickly. “Dani what…”

“Oh hey, Dani’s friend from college! Are you doing jokes too?” Eddie greets warmly. “I actually can’t believe she’s been keeping this from me all this time, and here was me- well, here was me thinking it was something else entirely.”

_ Really going all in on the taking an interest thing now, _ Dani notes bitterly.

“You’re here for the show then?” Jamie asks, her voice completely devoid of emotion.

“Yea! Can’t wait!” Eddie claps his hands together enthusiastically. 

It grates at every last nerve in Dani’s body. She doesn’t care though, not really. In fact she’s ignoring Eddie completely, trying to catch Jamie’s eye though the brunette steadily avoids her gaze.

“Yeah, it’s a big night,” Jamie tells Eddie instead. “Could sweep Dani into a whole new world if she impresses the people here tonight.”

Eddie scoffs. “Dani’s perfectly happy in this world,” he tells her. “She’s perfectly happy with me, so I won’t worry too much.”

Dani feels like screaming. Or maybe reaching out and grabbing Jamie’s hand, telling her Eddie doesn’t know what he’s talking about. She can’t quite do either though. Instead she feels rooted to the spot, like someone lost in a tide of lies.

“Right well..” Jamie motions to the stairs, once it’s clear Dani has nothing to add to Eddie’s statement. “I’m gonna head up. Enjoy.”

She stretches her lips into a razor thin smile then disappears at lightning speed up the stairs.

Eddie’s saying something else to Dani then, something about a drink maybe? Or perhaps a question on which seats were good ones? Dani doesn’t care though. Now that she’s watching Jamie walk off her mind finally seems to have caught up with the rest of her.

“Jamie…” she calls, already darting away from Eddie’s side. “Jamie wait.”

\----

“Jamie please.” Dani manages to catch her wrist as they round the corner into the dressing room. “Please can we-” she looks around the room, spots Owen and Hannah staring at them, drops her voice to a whisper. “- can we talk?”

Jamie glances down at Dani’s hand on her wrist, flexes it a little under Dani’s fingers, though she doesn’t quite pull it away.

“What’s to talk about Poppins?” She mutters, not quite meeting Dani’s eye.

“Jamie please…” Dani whispers desperately. “I need you to know. I tried to tell him, I did. Last night but he stopped me before I could- before I could get to the part about us. The important part. He stopped me before I could tell him and he just started- just started going on about comedy and, and about being relieved and I just…” she falters, a lump catching in her throat.

“And you just couldn’t last night,” Jamie finishes for her, heartbreakingly understanding like Jamie always was. “You could tell him about all this but you just couldn’t tell him that. You couldn’t tell him about me.”

“Jamie I will, I…”

“It’s fine,” Jamie whispers, slowly pulling her wrist free from Dani’s grip. “I’m fine,” she lies, finally looking up to meet Dani’s gaze, the twinkle in her eyes suddenly gone.

And then Jamie’s gone too. Just like that, pushing back down the stairs past her, Owen hot on her heels, calling after her, asking her to tell him what the hell’s going on.

Dani slumps back against the wall, lets hot tears slide down her cheeks, lets her breath catch in uneven hitches against the back of her throat as her entire world falls to shit around her.

Then there’s a hand on her shoulder, and Hannah’s smile through a fog of tears.

“Thought I told you to be careful?” Hannah muses softly, her free hand reaching up to wipe at some of Dani’s tears.

“I broke her heart Hannah,” Dani gasps breathlessly. “The one person I- I care about more than anyone else in this world and I just- I broke her heart.”

“I think you underestimate the heart's resilience dear,” Hannah sooths. “Or what it’ll go through for the right person.”

Dani shakes her head. “You don’t understand. I can’t hurt her anymore. That-” she gasps around a shaky sob. “The way she just looked at me. I can’t risk doing that to her again.”

“Then don’t,” Hannah tells her, with such a firmness Dani’s head snaps up. “Then don’t bloody hurt her Dani.” Hannah smiles a small smile. “Or myself and Owen will hurt you. I’m quite fond of you dear, but I can promise you that much.”

Dani lets out a shaky laugh. Wipes clumsily at her tear stained cheeks. 

“Seems fair,” she sniffles. “Hannah what if she doesn’t- what if she won’t--” she falters, afraid to think too much about all the countless ways this could end.

“What you two have,” Hannah starts, softer now. “It’s not something that hangs on a  _ what if.  _ Something as big as what the two of you have could never hang on something so delicate.”

Dani blows out a breath, wipes some more at her cheeks. “Thank you,” she says, just as the crowd downstairs begins to cheer. “Thank you.”

Hannah smiles. “Anytime. Now go, go do your show,” she urges.

“But-” Dani falters. “Jamie?”

Hannah smiles. “If you’re brave enough to get up onto that stage and tell jokes to a full house and a stuffy group of studio executives knowing fine well they may not laugh, then you’re brave enough to tell Jamie how you feel. Now go,” she insists with a firm nudge. “I’ll make sure she watches.”

Dani turns dumbly towards the stairs down to back-stage. She’s half ways to the curtain before Hannah’s final words find clarity in her head.

_ I’ll make sure she watches. _

Dani blows out a breath, steals herself as Viola announces her name and the crowd erupts into cheers.

“Be brave,” she whispers to herself as she takes her first tentative step out into the spotlight. “Go off script.”

\----

“Uh hi- hi there,” Dani clears her throat, searches the room.

Her eyes land first on Eddie, a few rows back, looking a little uncomfortable now that he’s not got to put on the show of overenthusiastic flair by Dani’s side. She glances away quickly. Her eyes keep scanning, barely registering the studio executives in one of the corner booths as she looks past them.

She can’t see Jamie though, or Hannah.

She clears her throat again, moves on. “So my name’s Dani and uh- and believe it or not I’m from suburbia. It’s uh- it’s not often I break away for a night like this either, so be kind to me.”

A ripple of laughter from the crowd. She doesn’t care.

“I’m actually here with my husband tonight. So for any of you regulars here this evening you’ll not have to endure any of my jokes about him this time I guess.”

Off stage right someone clears their throat. It’s Hannah, a reluctant looking Jamie hovering next to her, refusing to look up from the hardwood beneath her feet. Hannah nods once. Something in Dani’s belly lights like a fire.

She grabs the mic with both hands and pulls it from the stand. She lifts the stand out of her way and walks across the stage slowly.

“You see,” she starts, as she turns on her heel to walk back. “I love my husband very much. I do. Even when he farts in bed and blames it on the dog we don’t have. I love him.”

Dani smiles when the crowd laughs, she glances out at Eddie. Not laughing, though he never found her funny anyway she supposes.

“Even when I’m on a call with his mom for three hours as she tells me  _ exactly  _ how he likes his mash potatoes - Irish mothers and their sons, am I right - even then I love him dearly.”

Another ripple of laughter. Dani doesn’t smile along this time though. Instead she meets Eddie’s eye, tries to say  _ I’m sorry  _ from all the way across the room before she continues. She glances quickly at the side of the stage. Notes that Jamie looks even more uncomfortable now than she did before.

She licks her lips, pushes out her chest, pushes on.

_ Be brave. _

“You see it’s funny really. How much you can love someone even when uh- even when there’s part of you not built for loving that person. You see I’m uh-” she pauses, clears her throat. “Well I’m gay actually.”

A stunned silence. Dani doesn’t dare look out at Eddie, or across at Jamie now. Maybe as much as this moment had so much to do with both of them it could also just be her moment too. Her story, mixed up in so many other stories, some she loved and some she’d come to hate, but her story nonetheless.

“You’s weren’t expecting that,” she laughs into the mic. “And I know, I know what you’re thinking! Where’s my biker jacket and my buzz cut? Well you don’t get that until you become a premium member of the club so I’m told.”

She smiles with the brave few chuckles that ripple up from the room.

“And see, well I only realised recently that I was gay. Well no, that’s a lie,” she shakes her head fondly. “I realised the first time I saw Lynda Carter in Wonder Woman actually,” she gives the room a pointed look. “But you know what I mean, I only  _ realised  _ realised recently.”

She licks her lips. Taps her fingers against the mic and takes a few more paces about the stage.

“And I suppose now you’re wondering what all that has to do with my husband? Well some of you may already have figured it out actually,” she snorts, “because it’s a bit of a problem, me having a husband, isn’t it? And not just because of the gay thing, oh no.”

She shakes her head. Taps the mic again and looks out over the room, really allowing herself to fall into her storytelling groove even if she hasn’t quite figured out her ending yet.

“Because I really do think I could’ve repressed that for oh, another fifteen years maybe?” She shrugs. “And then we’d have kids to get ready to send out into the world and y’know what, that could add another ten years easy. Stay straight for the kids. Before you know it I’d be old and grey and it’d be too late.”

She sighs. Clicks her tongue against the roof of her mouth. Paces a little more just for good measure. All the while stealing herself for this next part.

“But no, my problem isn’t the gay thing, although I’m sure some of the more conservative members of the audience think it’s more than enough of a problem for me, it’s not really my problem.”

_ Be brave. _

“No my problem is that the entire reason I went on this little road trip, if you will, of self discovery in relation to my sexuality is because I made a rookie mistake that no married woman should make. I fell head over heels in love with someone that wasn’t my husband.”

She hears a few rushed gasps spread across the room. Thinks she might hear one from the side of the stage too though she ignores it, doesn’t allow herself the luxury of glancing over.

“And see that’s how I knew as well that I could never love my husband in the way he deserved. Because we’ve known one another since we were eight and yet I felt love more intensely in the first time this woman walked into the room than I have in my entire life with my wonderful, caring husband. Isn’t that wild?”

She scans the room again just in time to notice Eddie retreat towards the back doors. Part of her considers calling for him to stay. To explain to him more fully why she was doing this.

It’s too late for that now though. Too late to worry about that today when she had already put at risk her most important person.

She licks her lips and clears her throat. Realises vaguely that she might be crying, not that it matters. Not that any of it matters if she can’t say this next part.

“You know what’s even wilder? That I found that- that special, rare thing, of what it is to know true love, and I fucked it. I completely fucked it. I was scared and so rather than grab love with both hands I squandered it. I fucking broke her heart. The love of my life and I- I broke her heart,” she croaks out around gentle sobs.

She wipes at her eyes, laughs a little in spite of herself.

“And oh  _ god  _ I don’t even really know why I’m telling any of you this if I’m honest. I’m sure none of you care,” she sniffles, laughs a little more. “A very talented comedian once told me that when you’re doing comedy you’re supposed to get up on stage and twist the truth until it’s funny. Otherwise it’s just an ill advised therapy session. And so since there’s nothing at all funny about falling in love I do apologise for this ill advised therapy session.”

She blows out a breath, drags the mic stand back to centre stage.

“So anyway, that’s my- well I won’t call it a set. I think it has to be funny to be considered that. It’s my piece though. I just- I just hope it wasn’t said too late. I just hope I’ve not missed out on a happy ending because I was too scared to grab the thing I love with both hands and cherish it. To say fuck it to one day at a time and ask for a shot at forever instead.” 

She slides the mic back into the stand but doesn’t wait for the crowd to cheer - or boo as the case may be. She just steps down off the stage and into the crowd of tables.

Part of her wants to look back of course. To glance over at the side of the stage to try and gauge Jamie’s reaction. Maybe even run to Jamie and kiss her like her life depends on it. None of that feels fair though, not after what she’s just said. Not after everything she’s done. To apologise then run off to the side of the stage and demand it be accepted?

So she steps off the stage and into the crowd, pausing mid-way and turning back when she hears Viola awkwardly introducing the next act.

“Oh-kay well that was Dani Clayton everybody.” She doesn’t wait for applause. “Next up though is uh- is some of our more international talent. Please welcome to the stage, all the way from England, Jamie Taylor.”

Jamie’s usual saunter onto the stage seems stilted. Her entire expression is a little confused and otherwise unreadable. Dani’s stomach twists with guilt. Had this all been a mistake?

She grabs the mic out of the stand but doesn’t do her usual pacing. Just launches straight in.

“Uh, well hi there folks,” she waves, and the regulars in the room greet her fondly. “Uh, okay, well yeah, my name’s Ja--” she pauses, seems to consider something for just a second. “Actually hold on, wait a second, I’m really sorry.”

She laughs, shakes her head and then laughs some more. She taps the mic against her chin and then slowly brings it back up to her lips.

“You see, the weirdest thing just happened. Uh, someone- someone just told me they love me actually. So um, if you don’t mind I’ve one quick thing to do before I blow you all away with my comedic genius.”

She’s off the stage before the audience or Dani have a chance to process what’s going on.

She’s half ways to Dani, who’s still standing stock still in the centre of the room, by the time Dani has the good sense to open her arms and accept Jamie in an embrace that seems to slow time down to a standstill. 

“You mean it?” Jamie whispers against the shell of her ear.

“Not really any room for takebacks,” Dani murmurs, her smile practically splitting her cheeks as she leans back from the embrace to look Jamie in the eye. “Plus we’ve got a coffee machine now, can’t leave you to figure out how to use it by yourself.”

Jamie laughs and Dani laughs too and then they’re kissing and laughing at the same time. It’s messy, all teeth on account of the laughing, and a little wet on account of the tears, but it’s also perfect, so who cares really?

“You’ve a show to do,” Dani reminds her, pulling back far sooner than she’d like.

“Oh god yeah,” Jamie glances behind her at the stage. “I forgot.”

Dani laughs again, grabs Jamie’s cheeks between her hands and pulls her in for one final kiss. “Go, do your thing.” She kisses Jamie once more for good measure. “I love you and I’ll be right here when you’re done.”

Jamie grins, slowly starts backing away from Dani, towards the stage. “I love you too by the way,” she says finally, then turns on her heel and runs back up to the mic.

Dani feels like she’s floating.

\----

“Okay was I the  _ only  _ person that wasn’t aware of this,” Owen stares slack jawed at Hannah, who’d merely shrugged when Owen had gushed about the unforeseen drama that had just unfolded.

“My husband?” Dani offers, only feeling slightly bad about the dig when Jamie’s legs are draped across her lap and Jamie’s hand is toying with the baby hairs at the nape of her neck.

“You’re so funny,” Owen glares at her over on the couch.

“I’ve taught her well,” Jamie hums.

“Before you two start into it,” Hannah interrupts, just as Owen opens his mouth to fire back a retort, “May I suggest a drink? Once this whole competition is over? A celebration of whoever it is that’s managed to win tonight and uh,” she glances over at the couch. “A toast to young love perhaps?”

“Suppose no one’s stopping Dani going out now,” Owen agrees.

“Hey, hey,” Dani interrupts. “You don’t know that.” She turns to Jamie. “Well?”

Jamie rolls her eyes. “You’re impossible, you know that.”

“Yea, but you love me anyway.”

Jamie tries to hide her smile behind a weak glare. “Don’t make me regret saying that Poppins.”

Before Dani has a chance to respond Viola’s emerging at the top of the stairs. “Judges have made their decision, I want everyone back on stage in two minutes.” She shoots a glare at Dani. “Even you.”

Then she’s gone.

“Take it my stunt didn’t go over well then?” Dani hums.

“Why do I get the impression she’s going to drown you in your pint glass later?”

Dani laughs. “Would you mourn me? If Viola drowned me?”

Jamie shrugs. “Eh, I’d think about it. Might be a cool story to tell at a wedding sometime. The landlady of Bly Manor Bar drowning my girlfriend, cutting our time together short. Could be romantic.”

Dani shoves Jamie’s legs. “You’re absolutely ridiculous, you know that?” She pokes at her legs a bit more. “Now move, we need to go to the stage.”

Hannah and Owen are already on their way down and even though Dani’s fairly confident she hasn’t won, she wants to be there to support whoever did.

“Wait,” Jamie grabs at her hand, pulls her back down into the couch. “Before we go down I just…” she glances at the stairs down to the stage, waits for Owen’s head to disappear before continuing. “I want to make sure you’re okay?”

Dani shoots her a confused look. “Jamie of course I’m--”

“Not about us,” Jamie tells her with a shake of her head. “But what you did tonight, as romantic and amazing as it was, probably ruined your shot at getting a slot on Johnny Carson. Which is shitty, and unfair, and not at all how tonight should have gone because aside from a lot of other things you’re also the funniest person I know. So I just want to make sure that you’re okay? Because if you’re not then fuck Johnny Carson, and fuck going back down to that stage. We can just--”

“Jamie, Jamie…” Dani puts a gentle hand on the side of her face and holds it there until Jamie falls silent. “Tonight was never about Johnny Carson. None of this,” she motions around them, “was ever about Johnny Carson, or making it big.”

“Then what--”

“I’m a grade school teacher. I love being a grade school teacher. The reason I did this wasn’t to become a star. It was to prove to myself that I can. The first time we went for a drink together you asked me why comedy,” Dani reminds her. “And well, I did all of this to try and find something that made me happy. To try and find something that let me escape from suburbia for a few hours on a Friday evening and feel like a more authentic version of myself.”

“And?” Jamie asks, a small smile tugging her lips.

“And comedy was great for all those things,” Dani confirms. “But you-” she pokes Jamie in the chest. “You’re like the real life version of that Jamie. You’re not a few hours on a Friday night. You’re my forever.” She clears her throat, there’s been enough tears tonight already. “So I don’t need Johnny Carson. I’m happy to perform here, or in gay bars, or in hospitals, or whereever else I can perform, but I don’t need Johnny Carson to do that. I just need you.”

Jamie shakes her head. “You don’t need me. You were always funny.”

“I know,” Dani agrees. “Though I do need someone that I want to make laugh.”

“Poppins…” Jamie huffs out an embarrassed sort of laugh. “You flirt.”

Dani rolls her eyes. “Come on,” she pulls herself up until she’s standing, then offers a hand back to Jamie. “Let's go see about all this Johnny Carson business.”

Jamie looks up at her and takes her hand, a twinkle in her eyes.

Fin.

**Author's Note:**

> Anyway that's that. Tell me what you think.
> 
> I also got high a few nights ago and the notes in my phone are as follows:
> 
> "The stepmom AU no one asked for??? Pearl JAM!! Ooooh fuck Stepmom is the sad thing me and mam cried about when I was little" - so I think a Stepmom AU is what will happen next unless I see another classic film in the meantime. Watch this space!


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